Shuffling occupiers and Western media coverage
When Israel vacated its illegal settlements in the Gaza Strip last year as part of its “unilateral disengagement plan”, Western media commentators described the move as “historic” and generated a media frenzy reporting on every last detail of the settler evacuations. Lost in the hoopla over Israel’s “generosity” was the fact that the evacuated settlers would be resettled not within Israel proper, but within new and expanded illegal settlements in the West Bank. Last December, shortly after the Gaza Strip evacuation was completed, Israel approved a massive expansion of the Maale Adumim illegal settlement, already the largest in the West Bank. Today, Israel approved its first new illegal settlement since 1992 in the northern Jordan Valley specifically to accommodate families evacuated from the Gaza Strip. Both stories were completely absent from the front pages of CNN.com, MSNBC.com (which apparently finds unwanted Christmas presents a more fitting subject for a front page story), and FOXNews.com, and were mere bylines on BBC.com.