Gaza, Déjà vu: Context Matters

Over the past 24 hours I couldn't help but feel I have lived these moments before. I suppose that is because recent events are so similar to events which lead to the beginning of Israel's 23-day campaign in Gaza which left over 1,400 dead, most of whom where civilians.

The Arab world has been on fire now for months with one revolution after the other. Regimes that haven't fallen are cracking down on protesters, and the space allotted in one's mind for news is being dominated by Tunisia, Egypt, Bahrain, Yemen, Syria and of course, armed intervention in a bloody conflict in Libya. On Nov. 4th, 2008, the world was similarly distracted by another historic event: the election of the United State's first African-American president.

It was during that precise moment that

Israel shattered a truce that was brokered by the now fallen Mubarak regime months prior. The day after the attack that left several Palestinians dead, I knew this would lead to increased hostilities and create a pretext for a war that Israel had long planned. So I wrote pieces which I offered to various papers trying to highlight this moment, but no opinion pages had space for a piece on a few dead Palestinians with thousands of pieces on Obama's election coming in. Few news outlets even covered the attack on Gaza at the time; they were busy with the election.

So when the war on Gaza inevitably started at the end of December in 2008, it permitted many editors to create this simple, context free story line:

Israel must defend itself. And Hamas must bear responsibility for ending a six-month cease-fire this month with a barrage of rocket attacks into Israeli territory.

In fact, that is precisely how the NY Times began their lead editorial on Dec. 30th, addressing the bombing of Gaza that started the war. The Times had completely dismissed the fact that it was the Israelis which escalated the situation on Nov. 4th when the entire world was busy paying attention to the election. But you'd think before writing an editorial, particularly one in a major paper that will set the tone for public discourse, some research would be done. Maybe, just maybe, there was some publication out there that actually reported on the Nov. 4th Israeli attacks which broke the cease-fire and properly placed blame on Israel for restarting hostilities. It turned out there was one:

That's right. Buried on page A10, the NY Times actually reported on the strike on Gaza which broke the cease-fire. You can see pretty clearly that their headline above contradicts their editorial once the war started. I contacted the editors about this clear contradiction, and needless to say they were not interested in talking to me. I suppose they figured, "Hell, no one else was paying attention to what happened in Gaza on Nov. 4th, 2008. Why should we?" It seems they believed that if Palestinians were killed in Gaza and no one noticed, they could ignore the events altogether and no one would be the wiser. It worked. Most American's swallowed the info fed to them about the war - hook, line and sinker.

And so, here we are again. Yesterday, one Israeli artillery shell killed 4 times more unarmed Palestinian civilians in Gaza than hundreds of Qassam rockets have managed to kill in well over 2 years. Four members of the same family were killed while playing soccer outside: 11 year-old Muhammad Jihad Al-Hilu 16 year-old Yasser Ahed Al-Hilu 20 year-old Muhammad Saber Harara and 50 year-old Yasser Hamer Al-Hilu. And the coverage of this event?

The New York Times leads off with this, justifying Israeli rationale for what had to be a mistake:

An Israeli attempt to hit Palestinian militants who had fired rockets at Israel went horribly wrong on Tuesday, with mortar shells killing three youths playing soccer and a 60-year-old grandfather leaving his house.

Then there was this LA Times story:

Several Israeli tank shells landed Tuesday at a playground in Gaza City, killing three children and their grandfather and injuring 12 other children and women, hospital sources and witnesses said.

Eyewitnesses said that seven tank shells slammed a playground where children were playing soccer, adding two other shells crashed through the ceiling of a nearby house, injuring six women.

Relatives of those killed said they prevented a group of Palestinian militants from firing mortars into Israel from an area that is adjacent to their houses just half an hour before Israeli tanks fired the shells.

Notice how the LA Times talks about the act in the passive voice to introduce the story. "Several Israeli tank shells landed" Did they fall out of the clear blue sky? Of course not! They were fired by Israeli soldiers. But as far as this lead is concerned, the tank shells just landed. It is not until the third paragraph that any agency is assigned to any of the actions in this story, and it only comes AFTER mentioning Palestinian agency behind mortar attacks. What you see here is editors linguistically bending over backwards to convince the reader the Israelis took no action before Palestinians did, even though the story is supposed to be about Palestinian civilians who were killed when Israeli soldiers in an Israeli tank pushed a button to fire an Israeli artillery shell.

Another common feature of these stories is how shallow the context is. We are told Palestinians were killed by Israelis yesterday after Palestinians fired rockets over the weekend. 3 days, that's it. That's all the context we get. What happened before that? Don't we need to know? As far as editors are concerned, we don't.

This should give you an idea of some of the missing context, prior to the last three days, which usually doesn't make the cut. Take the last three months in Gaza, for example:

Palestinians Killed in Gaza in January:

65 year-old farmer Shaban Qarmut shot dead by Israeli forces.

25 year-old Mohamad Jamil Najjar killed in Israeli air strike.

20 year-old Amjad Sami Azzazeen killed in Israeli raid, 2 others injured.

13 year-old Basel Adwan killed by unexploded Israeli ordinance.

Palestinians Killed in Gaza in February:

Three fishermen, 20 year-old Jihad Fathi Khalaf, 25 year-old Tal'at Ar-Ruwagh, 29 year-old Ashraf Eqtefan, were killed by Israeli fire and two others wounded.

A Palestinian is killed and two others wounded in Israeli air strikes.

A Palestinian worker is shot and killed by Israeli forces.

Palestinians Killed in Gaza in March(thus far):

Adnan Shteiwi and Ghassan Abu Amr are killed in an Israeli air strike.

Five Palestinians are injured in Israeli airstrikes.

17 year-old Isam Farajallah and 17 year-old Qasim Iteiwa are killed by Israeli fire.

These are partial lists, and many others have been injured. Many more fall prey to Israel's siege and restrictions on Gaza, like those who die when tunnels collapse on them while they try to secure goods not permitted by the Israeli blockade. Then there are cases like Mohmoud Najjar, the 15 year-old cancer-stricken child who was denied exit from Gaza for an entire month to seek urgent treatment for his disease. He ultimately died, having received care far too late.

But despite the regular Israeli strikes on Gaza, whether they kill unarmed civilians, non-combatants, or combatants, we almost never hear about it. Then, when Israelis are attacked, reporting on these attacks completely deprives the reader of the necessary context to understand the ongoing conflict, the asymmetry of force and casualties and the underlying cause of all of it: the continued occupation of Palestinian territory and siege of the Gaza Strip.

The casualties above do not include victims of Israeli settler violence. But journalists find a way to write-off victims of Israeli strikes in Gaza and Israeli settlers in the West Bank by calling the periods during which these attacks occur "relative calm".

One can only hope that the Israelis are not planning another assault on Gaza, but the events of the past twenty-four hours bring back a disturbing feeling. If there is an escalation to full on war against Gaza, let's try to remember the context from which that escalation grew.

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