Pew: Flotilla raid dominates blogosphere

WASHINGTON, June 11 (UPI) -- More than 30 percent of the news links on the blogosphere were related to the May 31 raid by Israel of a humanitarian flotilla, the Pew Research Center said.

A survey of blog coverage from May 31-June 4 found 32 percent of news links on blogs were related to the flotilla raid.

Israeli forces stormed a Turkish-flagged vessel trying to break through an Israeli blockade on Gaza, killing nine activists on board.

The survey from the New Media Index from the Pew Research Center's Project for Excellence in Journalism found the majority of bloggers "expressed outrage" with Israel, though a "vocal minority" said Israel acted in self-defense.

Israel said it was justified in the raid because of concerns from weapons smuggling to militants in Gaza.

Meanwhile, of the top five most-viewed news videos on You Tube during the survey days, three were from video shot by Israeli forces on the Turkish vessel.

The story ranked second in the mainstream media with 13 percent of the coverage. The Deepwater Horizon oil spill consumed most of the conventional media coverage, the survey found.

"PEJ measures the topics that are of most interest to bloggers by compiling the quantitative information on links and analyzing the results," said Pew of its methods.