A very quick update on the varied converage of the war in Iraq. In May the U.S. military banned its soldiers from uploading their footage to youtube and MySpace. What has filled the vacuum, with official approval, is the Multi-National Force-Iraq channel on youtube. One can see here the familiar Virilio/Baudrillard plane's eye view of bomb factories being destroyed, marines escaping some desperate looking situations, snipers at work, somewhat incongrously mixed with footage of troops "interacting with the population":
http://www.youtube.com/MNFIRAQ A while back Derridata posted on this blog the now infamous footage of the soldiers taunting the Iraqi kids with bottled water. That footage was apparently the subject of an official investigation. It appeared courtesy of the much more in your face Ifilm's Warzone channel. One can also find here some very taut footage shot by soldiers, which they've edited to rap and rock soundtracks. Their "Jihad TV" section includes the astonishing British produced hip-hop video music video "Dirty Kuffar":
The following site is also archived on youtube, "Hometown Baghdad", a documentary series about three students trying to live in the most dangerous city on earth. It is an incredible on the ground view, extensively documented, given the 30-odd episodes:
The following site has attracted criticism for having a pro-Israel agenda through the manner in which it foregrounds aggressive clips. Nonetheless, the Middle East Media Research Institute's TV Monitor Project, which translates and subtitles selected media clips from Arabic and Iranian TV, does offer, in the words of the British Film Institute, "an unusual and surreal insight into the way people make propaganda". Here the order of the day is anti-American (and anti-Semetic) Iranian cartoons and comedy operas. I'd be interested to read some comparative analysis from both Israeli and Iranian media scholars in this instance:
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