Israeli Army’s Social Media Director Poses as Obama in Blackface

This is one of the more biased articles I read in the last few years. As an Israeli I think most of it is just rubbish. Take the part where they say Israel treats Africans like "animals". Let's ignore for a moment the side the writer takes and the part of inclusion they do on all Israeli. Israel is flooded with immigrants from all over Africa who cross the border between Israel and Egypt to find better lives and jobs. Now, while it's arguable if this kind of immigration should be accepted or not, the treatment to those who already came to our country is much different than what's described in the article. The gov for example, gives the immigrants working permits by the source of the country they cam from. Immigrants who declare (it's just a declaration which cannot be confirmed whatsoever) that they come from war-zones, are given work-permits and temporary visa to stay in the country. Those who are just coming to improve their lives and forget to lie to the immigration police on their birth country, are nicely expelled, as nice as this process can be. This is the practice most western countries take these days.

Moreover, in the last summer there was one time a small mob protested against Africans in a demand that the gov will take control of them, while the crime rates between them is very high. To take this exceptional event and throw it as the writer describes "Israeli protesters had begun attacking them in the streets with rocks and sticks" is just a try to give bad name to all Israeli. If you care enough for the facts, go and try to find the number of times such behavior was done, and don't blame the media for lack of sources since the media in Israel is pro-immigrants most of it.

There, I can continue on and on defending Israel against such shitty blames, although I lost hope in the recent years that my voice will be ever heard among all the reddit-israeli-hating mob.

Two things to note here -

1. The concept of "blackface" does not exist in Israel.

2. Looking at the picture, it was taken at the Dead Sea - where people go to put black, mineral rich mud all over their body (faces include). So this wasn't even someone pretending to be black, it was just someone putting mud on his face, taking a picture, than making a lame (private?) joke when uploading to Facebook.

Not only a non-HN story, but also just a non-story.

Could someone point out what the story is here? The linked article seems to suggest that an Israeli official painting his face black and captioning it 'Obama style' is racist, but I fail to see why. People dress up as other people all the time, and usually it's a sign of appreciation.

Flagged pending clarification.

Mud is applied to a soldier’s face as part of a training session about camouflage.

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2012/09/09/sunday-review...