Libya: The New York Times as Paper-of-Bloodshed

Would the Times editorial have been a little more informed and tempered if some of the opinion shapers at the newspaper were people of color, of African ancestry, or Africans?


[Black Star News Editorial]

For a so-called “liberal” newspaper The New York Times does itself great shame when it continues to sell warmongering on Libya as exemplified by it’s May 5 editorial, “Stalled Mission in Libya.”

What exactly is the mission in Libya?

According to United Nations Security Council Resolution 1973 it was to save civilians in the civil war, whether they be in harms way by government forces or by the pro-monarchy insurrectionists in Benghazi.

Yet, this isn’t the mission, according to Nicholas Sarkozy, David Cameron, Barack Obama, and Arthur Sulzberger’s New York Times.

The coalition of the willing-to-massively-bombard an-African-country without any remorse or consideration have their own idea of what the UN mission is; making a total mockery of the world organization.

Of course Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon, who faces re-election after the summer, needs U.S. endorsement and can’t afford to voice his outrage at how the UN has been pimped. Still, he may not get re-elected because African countries –most want a ceasefire– are creating a coalition to repudiate him for cow-towing to the U.S.

The U.S., France, Britain and the Times want regime change. They are not interested in a ceasefire; never mind that Libya was ten times more peaceful before the U.S., France and Britain started raining bombs on the country.

No wonder Russia’s Vladimir Putin referred to the invasion as a call to “medieval crusade.”

The warmongers, promoted on the pages of The New York Times with a fixation that’s frightening, utterly rejected the African Union (AU) proposal which called for an immediate ceasefire, creation of a humanitarian corridoor, and negotiations for a new political dispensation.

The AU proposal if it had been adopted would have already saved more lives than NATO’s and The New York Times‘ proposals; more bombings and more arms for Benghazi. The AU proposal remains the best plan on the table. President Obama would do the world and Africa a great service by inviting South African president Jacob Zuma to resurrect the plan. Sadly, political considerations and the impact on Obama’s re-election will preclude this option.

Is the whole world gone mad? There’s a big problem when both Sulzberger’s newspaper and Rupert Murdoch’s The Wall Street Journal are demanding for more bombings on Libya.

Saving civilians?

No Westerners really “care” about African civilians –or North Africans or Middle Easterners as the warmongers prefer, in order to excise the issue from Africa’s domain. Indeed, Libya’s “rescuers” confirm their peculiar tender caring nature by prescribing more bombings, interventions, and assassination attempts, as the cure for Libya’s civil war.

“Unless NATO, including the United States, get more serious,” writes the alleged paper of record turned paper of bloodshed, “Libya’s liberation war could turn into a prolonged, bloody stalemate. Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi is ruthless, and rebel forces are weak and disorganized.”

How about rebel forces are ruthless as well and have executed scores of captives and African migrant workers and Black Libyans?
The New York Times often criticizes The New York Post for ignoring the facts. Now, because it has the circulation, the Times ignores inconvenient truths about NATO’s bombings and about the Benghazi rebels in order to sell its bogus “liberation” war.

A liberation war led by fighters trained by a former al-Qaeda chief, as documented by The Wall Street Journal.  In the era of the Internet and Google, intelligent readers can access information online and see how the Times is serving as the propaganda organ of U.S. regime-change foreign policy.

So, how does the Times want to save Libya?

The paper of bloodshed recommends “the Pentagon needs to send America’s specialized low-flying attack planes, the A-10 and the AC-130, back into action against Libyan Army tanks. These are far more effective at destroying enemy vehicles and avoiding friendly ones.”

At least on one issue Sulzberger’s Times was honest.

All along, the Western countries had cynically claimed that the outside intervention was not about Libya’s phenomenal 44 billion barrels of known oil wealth. The Times lets the “secret” slip: “Events in Libya pose a more direct threat to Europe than to the United States. Europe relies heavily on Libyan oil and a prolonged crisis will cause serious shortfalls in Italy and other countries.”

Would the newspaper advocate such militarism if we were not dealing with an African country? Would the Times editorial have been a little more informed and tempered if some of the opinion shapers at the newspaper were people of color, of African ancestry, or Africans?

The Times has already answered that question; it does not give a damn.

The horror of it all.


“Speaking Truth To Empower.”

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