Gaza: The Wrong Kind of Protests
By J. Spooner & J.Stubbs
Prepared to risk death for liberation, rather than possessing a will to die, the Palestinians made their way towards the Gaza borders, where on the Israel side, safely positioned snipers awaited their arrival. May 14th was to be the climax of their protests, as The Trump Dynasty had arrived, just miles away to inagurate the new US Embassy in occupied Jerusalem. It was now the sixth week of the struggle. Many of their unarmed brothers and sisters had fallen at the hands of Israeli fire but still the thirst for freedom surpassed the collective refugees fears. All assembled were already too familiar with the Israeli penchant for deadly violence - the presence of the protesters with missing limbs gave an immediate reminder, but few there could’ve predicted the impending mass-murder just a trigger-finger away as chaos ensued while drones began dropping tear gas and the Israeli snipers in their gun towers began to unload on their defenseless victims.
Thousands were injured and scores were murdered, including children, paramedics and journalists. The fatalities far exceeded both Bloody Sunday and The Kent State Massacre combined but this wasn’t to be the Palestinian’s watershed moment. Palestinian life is disposable. The already dehumanised can’t lose their humanity. This was just the latest case of atrocities committed against the Palestinian people with impunity.
It was on this day that the eyes of the Western world finally turned these devastating scenes taking place on the Israel/Gaza border. As contentious or simply immoral as many of the UK mainstream media takes were, at least for that fleeting moment, all eyes were focused on Israeli actions and the longstanding plight of the Gazans. Yet, any reasonable member of the public would be forgiven for believing that these Palestinian civilians murdered on May 14th was an isolated event, rather than what it really was - the crescendo of Israeli violence unleashed after six weeks of a less dramatic kind of killing.
Since the Right of Return March began on March 30th, approximately 50 Palestinian civilians had been murdered and thousands injured on various days, every single week in the lead up to the 14th. It must also be noted that during this time not one Israeli had been injured, let alone killed. Not a scratch. This was the result of not only indiscriminate shooting but also of the “surgical” targeting of civilians by Israeli snipers safely positioned hundreds of yards away. May 14, as brutal and shocking as it was, was sadly the predictable culmination of the weekly horrors that came before it.
In the UK, the mainstream or establishment media, played its role in downplaying the events leading up to the massacre. Gaza’s courageous protesters attempted to bring the attention of the world to the oppression, poisoning and murder of their people. By demanding (amongst other things) that Israel lift the inhuman and illegal blockade, Gazans were literally dying to be heard. Yet the most influential UK media sites, reflecting an establishment loyalty to the State of Israel, failed the people of Gaza.
As doubtful as it seems that increased public awareness of the March of Return protests would have prevented in any way the slaughter on May 14, sadly we will never know for sure. For the UK government, Gazan protests over the six weeks leading up to May 14 attempted to draw attention to the inhumane breaches of international law and human rights committed by not only a strategic ally, but also a loyal client. Contrastingly, the Iranian anti-government protests at the end of 2017, beginning of 2018 highlighted similar breaches and injustices (albeit arguably on a smaller scale) committed this time by a state hostile to UK interests.
Good Protests VS Bad Protests
We analysed and compared the UK media coverage over the two weeks during the Iran protests to that of the six weeks of Gaza border protests, leading up to May 14th. Before delving into the numbers however, it is important to acknowledge the differences which exist between circumstances leading up to these events:
IRAN: 28th December, 2017- 12th of January, 2018. 23–25 killed. 1 Government police officer killed. Nearly 5000 arrests. Demonstrations focussed initially on economic grievances from Iranian citizens, whilst some took to the streets in political opposition to the Theocratic government of Iran and its longtime Supreme Leader.
Amnesty International’s 2017/18 annual report on Iran concluded:
“Trials were systematically unfair. Torture and other ill-treatment was widespread and committed with impunity. Floggings, amputations and other cruel punishments were carried out. The authorities endorsed pervasive discrimination and violence based on gender, political opinion, religious belief, ethnicity, disability, sexual orientation and gender identity. Hundreds of people were executed, some in public, and thousands remained on death row.”
On the 2017/18 demonstrations, Amnesty observed:
“…thousands of Iranians began flocking to the streets to speak out against poverty, corruption, political repression and authoritarianism. “The Iranian government must promptly launch an effective and independent investigation into the killings and other reports of excessive or unnecessary force, and bring all those responsible for human rights violations to justice.”
GAZA: March 31st -May 11th, 2018. Around 50 protesters killed and over a thousand injured by live and synthetic fire. No Israelis injured. Protests focused on the right of return for refugees and ending the illegal seige of Gaza.
Amnesty observed:
“Israel is carrying out a murderous assault against protesting Palestinians, with its armed forces killing and maiming demonstrators who pose no imminent threat to them.”
Amnesty argued that any failure to act against Israel by the international community:
“…will continue to fuel serious human rights abuses against thousands of men, women and children suffering the consequences of life under Israel’s cruel blockade of Gaza. These people are merely protesting their unbearable conditions and demanding the right to return to their homes and towns in what is now Israel.”
One could argue convicingly that either set of circumstances deserved more exposure. But stopping short of the immoral excercise in comparing suffering, it is clear that from a human rights point of view that both situations by their very nature deserved as much attention as possible. Yet only one situation appeared to receive this:
The above analysis focused on influential, major national news outlets such as the BBC and the Guardian. We also included the Independent and The Times for ‘left’-leaning and ‘right’-leaning representatives. Astoundingly, ALL of these major news media sites produced more articles/videos covering the fortnight of Iranian protests than they did in the entire six weeks of Gazan protests. Thus on average, each news site produced significantly more articles per day/week (between three and nine times more) covering Iran than Gaza. As a side note, these same news sites released a total of eleven articles addressing Labour/Jeremy Corbyn’s response to the Iranian protests - The Times (five) and The Independent (four) being the most prolific. This compares to only a single article published which related back to Theresa May’s response to the Gaza protests (via Independent).
The Iran Affect
The above figures go some way to demonstrate the differential media treatment given to ‘friends’ of the UK government versus that given to traditionally hostile states who challenge Western policies in the Middle East. Major national UK media affords Israel the luxury of minimising their human rights abuses whilst magnifying and repeatedly condemning similarly atrocious acts by Iran.
Yet it’s not always the case that Iranian voices receive the overwhelming majority of UK media attention as naturally, this depends on the narrative being pushed. Another recent example of the coverage of these two countries highlights such selective bias. On the 10th of May, 2018, Israel launched dozens of missiles into Syria, killing over 40 people. These attacks were lubricated by two key public relations talking points fed to the world’s media by the IDF: 1) The strikes were in retaliation to attacks on the occupied Golan Heights from Iranian forces in Syria and 2) That these retaliatory strikes targetted Iranian outposts situated in southern Syria.
This definitely seemed quite conceivable, even considering the IDF’s public relations branch are renowned for their overblown propaganda. However this version of events was almost uniformly reported as fact, as opposed to what it actually was - one side’s account.
The IDF narrative on the May 10 strikes centred on Iran being responsible for the assault on the Golan Heights and thus the targets of Israeli retaliatory strikes. Unsurprisingly, this version of events goes some way toward potentially absolving Israel of further public criticism/scrutiny: if the assaults were instead potrayed as Israeli strikes on Syrian bases, in retaliation to Syrian strikes against occupied Syrian territory, Israel’s actions would be presumably (publicly/legally/morally) much harder to justify.
Still, the UK media (much like the rest of the world) not only accepted but embraced the IDF version of events without question or hint of scepticism. In the days following the strikes, we analysed all related articles published from the same four media outlets. All of the 17 articles published from these sites were framed in the IDF’s narrative, portraying the confrontations as Iran versus Israel. Of course, the Israeli version of events should have been vital to any report. But so too should have been the Iranian/Syrian version of events. Yet, on the very rare (2/17 articles) occasion it was included, it gathered a minor mention, taking up only a sentence or two. More astoundingly, the Syrian version of events was not reported on at all.
Predictably, all the above noted articles featured “Iran” in the headline and all offered a multitude of takes on all aspects of Iran’s assumed involvement. The Israeli version of events was simply accepted as gospel. The media script provided by the IDF to these attacks was as measured and strategic as the strikes themselves. In contrast to IDF claims, Iran denied involvement and Syria claimed that they themselves had attacked Israel in retailiation to Syrian army bases being attacked. Yet strikingly, these versions of events were completely ignored and omitted by the Israeli-friendly UK media.
Gazans - A Permanent Disinterest
Henry Kissinger once opined “America has no permanent friends or enemies, only permanent interests” and it is these geopolitical interests which dictate the value of a man’s life and his struggle. Liberty, justice and above all democracy (See Egypt, 2013) are mere fig-leafs used by neo-Imperialist and Colonialist powers. Protecting the security of Israel and maintaining its position as the regionally dominant military power is a central tenet of neoconservatism; so it should come as no surprise to see such a stark contrast in treatment between those protesting Israeli oppression and those protesting oppression by Israel’s enemy.
The effortless ability of mainstream UK media to mirror government allegences and accentuate animosity to officially hostile states serves as a reminder of the underlying establishment influence over an ever-subservient press. As a traditionally uncooperative and sometimes unfriendly actor towards UK government policy, mainstream media chooses to expose and highlight Iranian human rights abuses at any given opportunity. Yet, whether it be coverage of the protests in Gaza or selective reporting of the conflicts in the Golan Heights, Israel is protected throughout the UK media to an extent only dreamed of by official UK enemies. Israel/Palestine expert and scholar, Dr Norman Finkelstein recently stated:
“There were all sorts of things that could have been done in the six weeks leading up to May 14, from vigils to sit-ins to hunger strikes to demonstrations.”
Sadly, these “things” were highly reliant on the public being adequately informed and thus motivated enough to be able to take such action. And unfortunately, for the people of Gaza, theirs was the wrong kind of protest.
