The sad old saga of what passes for news in the United States is highlighted (or in this case, circled with a red crayon) in the accompanying image.

Starving masses under siege break through the wall enclosing them, and the American journal of record talks about shopping sprees, as if there was some mythical Nordstrom's or Macy's in the desert beyond the wall, staffed presumably by Egyptian conscripts in tasteful couture, their caps scented with high notes of peach.

Meanwhile in Israel, the sabers are rattling, rattling, rattling. The Gaza situation is ranked as having "middling" importance by the left-wingers (because starving millions of Gazans is not against their
ethical standards) and welcomed by the Israeli right wingers, who seem overjoyed at the opportunity to get the occupier's responsibility for Palestinians off their hands.

But it isn't just the right wingers. There has been, this week, a shift toward war rhetoric among some of the journalists on the left, ones who frequently reflect the mood of that nation. There is a campaign of interviews with soldiers talking about how they'll do to Gaza what they couldn't do in Lebanon (seen on Ynet -link in Hebrew), and fear mongering about expected attacks on Israelis in the Sinai are being bandied about widely (link in Hebrew).

All that, and starving masses obtaining food through a walled enclosure are on a "shopping spree". Historians of the future, take note: spinning the ghetto break as "shopping" reflects a mood of the moment. Evil is as banal as it ever was.