The MEDIA is driving US headlong into WAR

One provocation after another, it is becoming painfully obvious that the media is both being manipulated and manipulating the masses headlong into war.

Video images of British soldiers allegedly beating Iraqi youths with batons and fists aired throughout the Middle East and Britain on Sunday, outraging locals and prompting British Prime Minister Tony Blair to vow a full investigation.

Coming on the heels of the cartoon controversy, with Abu Ghraib still not adequately resolved and Guantanomo broiling in the background, Arab and Muslim fury is poised to reach fever pitch.

Arab satellite television stations, including Al-Jazeera and Al-Arabiya, replayed the footage throughout the day and juxtaposed the images alongside pictures from the Abu Ghraib prisoner abuse scandal.

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The tape was obtained by the News of the World tabloid newspaper from a whistleblower it did not identify. The footage purportedly shows a street confrontation in which Iraqi youths throw objects at British soldiers and then flee down the street. The cameraman provides narration and urges the soldiers on.

Who is the unidentified whistleblower? And what kind of cameraman urges soldiers to brutalize civilians?

I don't doubt that these brutalities took place and I do not suggest that they should be withheld from the public. But, the timing of their release is remarkably suspect.

The newspaper claims the video was filmed in southern Iraq by a corporal two years ago.

The British government said military police were investigating the allegations.

Two years ago?! And they're just surfacing now, before an imminent attack on Iran and on the heels of global Muslim outrage at insults to the prophet Muhammad?

A Ministry of Defense spokesman, Brig. Martin Rutledge, said the images were "extremely disturbing and are the subject of an urgent Royal Military Police investigation."

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Basra resident Muhannad al-Moussaoui said, "We thank God that it comes from their own photography."

This footage seems more like a calculated manipulation than divine intervention. But, perhaps it's a little of both.