Propaganda and media manipulation

Sela, according to sources close to the meeting, had been called in so that Olmert could ask his opinion on the likely effectiveness of a similar raid to Opera on the nuclear installations of Iran.

Peace in the Middle East depends on Sela's and Israel's answer. Yesterday, responding to the Israel's increasingly bellicose language, Iran's top Revolutionary Guards Commander, General Mohammad Ali Jafari, warned that it would respond to any attack by hitting Israel with missiles and threatened to control the oil shipping passage through the meeting at the home of Israel's Prime Minister Ehud Olmert was not supposed to be public. The man invited into Olmert's official residence in Jerusalem was Aviam Sela, architect of Operation Opera in 1981, when Israel launched a long-range strike against Iraq's Osirak nuclear reactor. Regarded as a brilliant aviation tactician, in particular in the field of in-flight refuelling, Olmert's office tried to play down the meeting. But the rumours in Israel's defence establishment were already flying.

Sela, according to sources close to the meeting, had been called in so that Olmert could ask his opinion on the likely effectiveness of a similar raid to Opera on the nuclear installations of Iran.

The other main thing to bear in mind when considering any given media story is to ask oneself, NOT if it's 'true', but instead: 'Who would benefit if it was widely believed that this was true?'. Cui bono is, unfortunately, as relevant as it ever was.

So what do they do? The 'liberal' response to this is as follows: 'we' live in a free market economy. Newspapers and movies and TV channels which fail to gain 'market share' go under. 'Popular' channels and movies and newspapers gain readers and, therefore, revenue. In the broadest sense of the words, therefore, the public gets the media it deserves. The media does (and, indeed, must) reflect public views and opinions.

Seems one Alexis Debat, a (now ex-) ABC consultant, has been responsible for a number of alarming stories about the global terror threat which, um, turn out not to be, well, you know, true in any way.  Those stories include:

• The Pentagon's blitzkrieg plan for Iran (Times, here)
  
• Massive suicide bomber training in Pakistan (ABC, here)
  
• And possibly the reports of Iran's sudden expansion of nuclear facilities (ABC, here)
  

It would be cool, had I the time, to build a meme tracking database for this kind of stuff, but I don't.  If you have anything to add, add it in comments.

Oh -- final tidbit.  Mr. Debat worked for the Nixon Center.