Libya is not helped by this prism of propaganda

[maddezmom]

Media talk of tank battles and swooping bombers is inflating an already serious situation – with dangerous consequences


of them dubious'. Photograph: John Moore/Getty Images

Sitting in Tripoli is to be disconnected from reality. There is the propaganda effort from Colonel Muammar Gaddafi's regime that sometimes would verge on the ridiculous if the situation were not so tragic. This is a phenomenon that has been well documented by the media camped here at the regime's invitation.

But there is another disconnect. What you read of events often close to the city, filtered through opposition voices, is frequently equally as misleading, creating an impression that has crept its way inexorably into the international media. Pitched battles are described breathlessly as if they were major confrontations – tanks on tanks, brigade on brigade, with the buzz of aircraft always in the air, swooping in to bomb.

In the town of Zawiyah last week – "the key town of Zawiyah", as it has become – a few hours of skirmishes that left a handful of dead was transformed via this prism into a confrontation between two sides armed with tanks. I have read of helicopter attacks on civilians in neighbourhoods of the capital; the bombing of outlying towns. Yet – for now at least – I have not found evidence of it. What I have found is serious enough. Opposition supporters in a government-controlled town who say they are fearful of their lives if they speak out, and the graves of those killed fighting in Zawiyah.

It is true too there have been more serious clashes in the east of the country, and air raids witnessed by my colleague Martin Chulov. But still there is much about this narrative that does not feel real.

more:http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/mar/03/libya-prism-propaganda-media-talk-battles