According to the United Nations Office on Genocide Prevention and the Responsibility to Protect, the definition of ‘War Crimes’ includes: “those violations of international humanitarian law (treaty or customary law) that incur individual criminal responsibility under international law. As a result…war crimes must always take place in the context of an armed conflict, either international or non-international.” Thus, we can establish that the violence unleashed each day in Gaza over the last two weeks constitutes Israeli war crimes. What remains even more clear, however, is that we aren’t receiving news about these on-ground realities from western media but from social media.
Following the hashtags, reading tweets, watching video clips and live updates from Palestinians caught up in the eye of this terrifying storm reminds us of the appalling western media bias andspreading of propaganda, the likes of which Joseph Goebbels, Nazi Germany’s Propaganda minister would have been proud. The New York Times is doing its best to stay passive and neutral, albeit giving in to social media captions that reinforce the myth of rocket fire by “Gaza militants” triggering Israeli retaliation. CNN has reported in the past on this issue with such headlines as, ‘Israel’s military campaign against Islamic Jihad’ while emphasising the UN condemnation of Hamas’ rocket attacks. The BBC has been choosing to update its social media platforms with useful tips on ‘how to hug’ in the time of Covid-19. All this during a time when the world appears to be on the brink of full-scale war.
The Electronic Intifada’s David Cronin has long spoken about western media bias when covering the Israel-Palestine conflict, including when an editor at The Guardian advised him to “steer clear of covering the conflict altogether”. The reason: the pro-Israel lobby
David Cronin, an associate editor of the Electronic Intifada, has long spoken about this bias , including when an editor at The Guardian advised him to “steer clear of covering the conflict altogether”. The reason: the pro-Israel lobby. This was no isolated incident. Sarah Helm, a former correspondent at the Independent, another British newspaper, has past noted in the past:”You always come under particular pressure with [reporting on events in Israel and Palestine] because there is an intense and concerted Israeli media lobby – and there always was. And that includes intense Israeli political lobby working at every single level, which there always was too – and that was no secret nor would they make a secret of it.” Everyone appears to be terrified of putting the wrong foot forward and being accused of anti-Semitism.
A video clip that recently went viral is of a 2014 interview conducted by American journalist and activist Abby Martin on the programme “The Empire Files”. It gives us more insight into what Israeli citizens think of the conflict. Some of the responses are terrifying. One elderly man is seen saying, “I think Israel deserve to take over. It would be much better if they [the Palestinians] went back to Arab countries”. Of course, the Palestinians never came from anywhere else. What Israel now occupies,used to be their home. “We conquered this place rightfully; it’s ours,” says a young woman. She appears well-spoken and intelligent yet she talks about conquering lands as if she is giving directions to her house. Her confident tone suggests that she believes this not be mere opinion but, rather, a fact.
The Guardian reported last week that “Israel vows not to stop Gaza attacks until there is ‘complete quiet'”. This blatant threat to the Palestinian people not only set the world ablaze with protests – it also laid bare western media’s hypocritical silence, and complete and utter disregard for thechampioning of certain “human rights”.
Following on this,it should therefore come as no surprise to hear a young man on the Abby Martininterview saying: “I don’t think there’s any solution to it; there’s only one way: I would carpet bomb them. It’s the only way you can deal with it.” If this is what the people of Israel were saying a few years ago, we see clearly that these sentiments have translated into action. What is most difficult to watch is a teenage girl at the end of the clip saying that “we need to kill Arabs”. It is even more difficult to digest the fact that she’s saying it while laughing. We need to be on the right side of history when all this is over. Remaining silent only amounts to complicity.
The writer is a lawyer and teacher based in Colombo, Sri Lanka. She writes for the Sri Lanka-based “The Morning” newspaper and tweets @writergirl_11