OPINION | MEDIA | DEHUMANIZATION | PALESTINE
On Barbarity and Civilization
How Western coverage of Hamas’s assault on Israel on Oct. 7, describing it as “barbaric”, an “act of savagery,” prepared their audiences to accept genocide…
2023–10–22
With alarming consistency, Western coverage of Hamas’s assault on Israel on Oct. 7 invariably describes it as “barbaric”, an “act of savagery.” What exactly do such terms mean, and what are their implications?
The Berbers, the indigenous people of North Africa, unwillingly lent their name to a term that came to mean the vilest opposite of civilization. The Romans who coined it emphasized their own “civilization” as opposed to “barbarians”, in order to feel justified about slaughtering those others. Since, such demonization of the other — often a group that differs racially or culturally from “us” — has historically been used as a prelude to genocide and mass slavery. The settlers of North America had had their “savages”, and Christopher Columbus his “cannibals”.
Israel has in two weeks murdered 4000 Palestinians by dropping 7000 tons of explosives on heavily-populated areas. We are supposed to accept that human toll, because the pilot flew over a target and dropped a bomb from the sky — in a very civilized American-like “democratic” manner. (The “democracy” that has no constitution and holds six million Palestinians without voting rights in a draconian system of apartheid.)
Despite the media’s claim to “both side-ism”, when they call Palestinian actions “barbaric”, while praising the other side’s actions as “civilized,” they are taking sides.
When Israel bombed al-Ahli hospital last week, commentators and even the US president rushed to accept Israel’s disclaimer of responsibility — a failed Jihad rocket. Never mind that the Palestinian groups denied that. If it’s their word vs Israel’s, there is no question since the latter is a “civilized” “democracy” while the former are “barbaric” “terrorists”. There was no debate or discussion.
The US government’s and the media’s derogatory labeling incites the public and makes them more tolerant of massive losses in Palestinian lives. It is for this reason that many human rights activists like myself fear an impending genocide. Palestinian lives are implicitly assumed to be worth far less than “civilized” Israeli lives.
The next time you watch CNN, or BBC, or even MSNBC, as yourself, “Am I getting both sides?”
When the cameras, and the top correspondents, are situated in Israeli towns observing the rockets coming in and Israelis hiding in shelters, they are taking sides.
You rarely see the view from Gaza’s streets. When it is discussed, Gaza is described as a “humanitarian crisis,” as if it was visited by a hurricane or an earthquake, as if Israel bears no responsibility for the calamity.
“We apologize for the poor transmission,” cutting short the interview with a Palestinian or a human rights worker — a shoddy excuse given that Israel has intentionally cut power and internet to Gaza. Instead of striving for fair coverage, they give the Israeli guests more air time, thanks to their crystal-clear reception borne of a technologically-advanced “democracy”. And thanks to the prevalence of Israelis who have recently immigrated there from Western countries, the media has no shortage of Israeli interviewees with a perfect American or British accent. The Palestinian interviewees are rarely afforded adequate interpreters.
Palestinians hold “hostages”, when in fact Israel for the last 50 years has been kidnapping and imprisoning Palestinians without trial or due process, including many women and children. According to Defense of Children International,
“Each year approximately 500–700 Palestinian children, some as young as 12 years old, are detained and prosecuted in the Israeli military court system. The most common charge is stone throwing.”
Israeli victims are almost never interviewed in the immediate aftermath of the trauma they experienced, but only after the fact, the reporter often visiting them in their homes. Having spent a night of bombing outdoors, just to find their apartment building completely gone, the Palestinian victims are interviewed immediately, on the street, expressing the terror they had just experienced in loud, hasty and incomprehensible Arabic. To a Western audience, this image reinforces the perception of the “angry” “barbarians”.
The message is simple. One side is like us — dresses like us, talks like us, is a “civilized democracy”, while the other is a “barbaric enemy” that must be, in the words of Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu, “eliminated.”
Watch the coverage and judge for yourself. Are you being groomed to identify with one party more than the other? To take the side they chose for you? To support Israel wholeheartedly regardless of how inhumane and genocidal its actions may be?
