Of course, middle eastern reporting is further tinged by a lot of bias – anti-Israel, anti-Bush, etc. This makes it even worse than normal.

Now back to Rice whose State Dept plays a role in guiding the media and shaping issues, perceptions of events, etc. One of the things that you miss, David, is that Rice’s very claim –very widely echoed– that Jewish settlements over the 1949 armistice line are either “illegal” or unjust or “an obstacle to peace” is a profoundly racist claim. Certainly Rice should be sensitive to this moral flaw in her position. But she is not. Nor are the media or NGO spokespersons [for instance, for Amnesty or human rights watch] sensitive to their own moral distortions, nor the British Foreign Office. To say that Jews can’t live in certain places that were part of the ancient Jewish homeland, that were assigned to the Jewish National Home by the San Remo Conference [1920] and the League of Nations [1922], that were never separated from the rest of the Land of Israel by a border recognized as such by either side — is racist. Therefore, many diplomats are racist against Jews, many journalists likewise, many NGOs, many “human rights” outfits [amnesty & hrw, for instance], and many UN officials who ignore the true international law status of Judea-Samaria and the Gaza Strip.
David, you, as a resident of Efrat, ought to be sensitive to this problem.
Moreover, former US president Carter wants to exclude Jews from Judea-Samaria & the Gaza Strip. Yes, I consider Carter too a racist against Jews on account of that position. Indeed, Carter supports apartheid against Jews.