The other day my friend Charles began describing the situation in Sri Lanka to me, a situation I had only a vague understanding of (and still do), but the horror of which was readily apparent. So where was the mainstream media attention? Where was any media attention? As indicated in today's cartoon, most of the oxygen in the room (as the saying goes) has been sucked up by the Israeli government's war with Hamas and the hundreds of people it has killed. The rest of the "oxygen" goes to Iraq and Afghanistan, I suppose. Charles deserves credit for joking about the lack of a Sri Lankan or Tamil Tiger lobby group in Washington. I thought about adding the country's lack of oil, but guess what — they got some, with a $billion help from Iran.

For anyone still scratching their heads about the Sri Lankan situation, the BBC offers a handy primer. Then proceed to Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch for a deeper investigation of the humanitarian crisis and human rights violations inflicted on the Sri Lankan people by their government and the Tamil Tiger rebel group. As in the Middle East, innocent people get caught in the crossfire yet have no real voice or power to stop it.

Slideshow at Yahoo.