In the US, Gaza is a different war
By Habib Battah
January 05, 2009 "Al Jazeera" -- - The images of two women on the front page of
an edition of The Washington Post last week illustrates how mainstream US media
has been reporting Israel's war on Gaza.
On the left was a Palestinian mother who had lost five children. On the right
was a nearly equally sized picture of an Israeli woman who was distressed by
the fighting, according to the caption.
As the Palestinian woman cradled the dead body of one child, another infant
son, his face blackened and disfigured with bruises, cried beside her.
The Israeli woman did not appear to be wounded in any way but also wept.
Arab frustration
To understand the frustration often felt in the Arab world over US media
coverage, one only needs to imagine the same front page had the situation been
reversed. If an Israeli woman had lost five daughters in a Palestinian attack,
would The Washington Post run an equally sized photograph of a relatively
unharmed Palestinian woman, who was merely distraught over Israeli missile
fire?
When the front page photographs of the two women were published on December 30,
over 350 Palestinians had reportedly been killed compared to just four
Israelis.
What if 350 Israelis had been killed and only four Palestinians - would the
newspaper have run the stories side by side as if equal in news value?
Like many major news organisations in the US, The Washington Post has chosen to
cover the conflict from a perspective that reflects the US government's
relationship with Israel. This means prioritising Israel's version of events
while underplaying the views of Palestinian groups.
For example, the newspaper's lead article on Tuesday, which was published above
the mothers' photographs, quotes Israeli military and civilian sources nine
times before quoting a single Palestinian. The first seven paragraphs explain
Israel's military strategy. The ninth paragraph describes the anxiety among
Israelis, spending evenings in bomb shelters. Ordinary Palestinians, who
generally have no access to bomb shelters, do not make an appearance until the
23rd paragraph.
To balance this top story, The Washington Post published another article on the
bottom half of the front page about the Palestinian mother and her children.
But would the paper have ever considered balancing a story about a massive
attack on Israelis with an in-depth lead piece on the strategy of Palestinian
militants?
Context stripped
Major US television channels also adopted the equal time approach, despite the
reality that Palestinian casualties exceeded Israeli ones by a hundred fold.
However, such comparisons were rare because the scripts read by American
correspondents often excluded the overall Palestinian death count.
By stripping the context, American viewers may have easily assumed a level
playing field, rather than a case of disproportionate force.
Take the opening lines of a report filed by NBC's Martin Fletcher on December
30: "In Gaza two little girls were taking out the rubbish and killed by an
Israeli rocket - while in Israel, a woman had been driving home and was killed
by a Hamas rocket. No let up today on either side on the fourth day of this
battle."
Omitted from the report was the overall Palestinian death toll, dropped
continuously in subsequent reports filed by NBC correspondents over the next
several days.
When number of deaths did appear - sometimes as a graphic at the bottom of the
screen - it was identified as the number of "people killed" rather than being
attributed specifically to Palestinians.
No wonder the overwhelmingly asymmetrical bombardment of Gaza has been framed
vaguely as "rising tensions in the Middle East" by news anchors.
With the lack of context, the power dynamic on the ground becomes unclear.
ABC news, for example, regularly introduced events in Gaza as "Mideast
Violence". And Like NBC, reporters excluded the Palestinian death toll.
On December 31, when Palestinian deaths stood at almost 400, ABC correspondent
Simon McGergor-Wood began a video package by describing damage to an Israeli
school by Hamas rockets.
The reporter's script can be paraphrased as follows: Israel wanted a
sustainable ceasefire; Israel needed to prevent Hamas from rearming; Hamas
targets were hit; Israel was sending in aid and letting the injured out; Israel
was doing "everything they can to alleviate the humanitarian crisis". And with
that McGregor-Wood signed off.
Palestinian perspective missing
There was no parallel telling of the Palestinian perspective, and no mention of
any damages to Palestinian lives, although news agencies that day had reported
five Palestinians dead.
For the ABC correspondent, it seemed the Palestinian deaths contained less news
value than damage to Israeli buildings. His narration of events, meanwhile,
amounted to no less than a parroting of the official Israeli line.
In fact, the Israeli government view typically went unchallenged on major US
networks.
The US media has been accused of prioritising Israel's version of events [EPA]
Interviews with Israeli spokesmen and ambassadors were not juxtaposed with the
voices of Palestinian leaders. Prominent American news anchors frequently
adopted the Israeli viewpoint. In talk show discussions, instead of debating
events on the ground, the pundits often reinforced each other's views.
Such an episode occurred on a December 30 broadcast of the MSNBC show, Morning
Joe, during which host Joe Scarborough repeatedly insisted that Israel should
not be judged.
Israel was defending itself just as the US had done throughout history. "How
many people did we kill in Germany?" Scarborough posed.
The blame rested on the Palestinians, he concluded, connecting the Gaza attacks
to the Camp David negotiations of 2000. "They gave the Palestinians everything
they could ask for, and they walked away from the table," he said repeatedly.
Although this view was challenged once by Zbigniew Brzezinski, a former US
official, who appeared briefly on the show, subsequent guests agreed
incessantly with Scarborough's characterisation of the Palestinians as
negligent, if not criminal in nature.
According to guest Dan Bartlett, a former White House counsel, the Palestinian
leadership had made it "very clear" that they were uninterested in peace talks.
Another guest, NBC anchor David Gregory, began by noting that Yasser Arafat,
the late Palestinian president, "could not be trusted", according to Bill
Clinton, the former US president.
Gregory then added that Hamas had "undercut the peace process" and actually
welcomed the attacks.
"The reality is that Hamas wanted this, they didn't want the ceasefire," he
said.
Columnist Margaret Carlson also joined the show, agreeing in principal that
Hamas should be "crushed" but voicing concern over the cost of such action.
Thus the debate was not whether Israel was justified, but rather what Israel
should do next. The Palestinian human tragedy received little to no attention.
Victim's perspective
Arab audiences saw a different picture altogether. Rather than mulling Israel's
dilemma, the Arab news networks captured the air assault in chilling detail
from the perspective of its victims. The divide in coverage was staggering.
For US networks, the bombing of Gaza has largely been limited to two-minute
video packages or five minute talk show segments. This has usually meant a few
snippets of jumbled video: explosions from a distance and a momentary glance at
victims; barely enough time to remember a face, let alone a personality.
Victims were rarely interviewed.
The availability of time and space, American broadcast executives might argue,
were mitigating factors.
On MSNBC for example, Gaza competed for air time last week with stories about
the economy, such as a hike in liquor sales, or celebrity news, such as
speculation over the publishing of photographs of Sarah Palin's new grandchild.
Most US networks have reported exclusively from Israel [GALLO/GETTY]
On Arab TV, however, Gaza has been the only story.
For hours on end, live images from the streets of Gaza are beamed into Arab
households.
Unlike the correspondents from ABC and NBC, who have filed their reports
exclusively from Israeli cities, Arab crews are inside Gaza, with many
correspondents native Gazans themselves.
The images they capture are often broadcast unedited, and over the last week, a
grizzly news gathering routine has been established.
The cycle begins with rooftop-mounted cameras, capturing the air raids live.
After moments of quiet, thunderous bombing commences and plumes of smoke rise
over the skyline. Then, anguish on the streets. Panicked civilians run for
cover as ambulances careen through narrow alleys. Rescue workers hurriedly pick
through the rubble, often pulling out mangled bodies. Fathers with tears of
rage hold dead children up to the cameras, vowing revenge. The wounded are
carried out in stretchers, gushing with blood.
Later, local journalists visit the hospitals and more gruesome images, more
dead children are broadcast. Doctors wrap up the tiny bodies and carry them
into overflowing morgues. The survivors speak to reporters. Their distraught
voices are heard around the region; the outflow of misery and destruction is
constant.
Palestinian voices
The coverage extends beyond Gaza. Unlike the US networks, which are often
limited to one or two correspondents in Israel, major Arab television channels
maintain correspondents and bureaus throughout the region. As angry protests
take place on a near daily basis, the crews are there to capture the action
live.
Even in Israel, Arab reporters are employed, and Israeli politicians are
regularly interviewed. But so are members of Hamas and the other Palestinian
factions.
The inclusion of Palestinian voices is not unique to Arab media. On a number of
international broadcasters, including BBC World and CNN International,
Palestinian leaders and Gazans in particular are regularly heard. And the
Palestinian death toll has been provided every day, in most broadcasts and by
most correspondents on the ground. Reports are also filed from Arab capitals.
On some level, the relatively small American broadcasting output can be
attributed to a general trend in downsizing foreign reporting. But had a
bloodbath on this scale happened in Israel, would the networks not have sent in
reinforcements?
For now, the Israeli viewpoint seems slated to continue to dominate Gaza
coverage. The latest narrative comes from the White House, which has called for
a "durable" ceasefire, preventing Hamas terrorists from launching more rockets.
Naturally the soundbites are parroted by US broadcasters throughout the day and
then reinforced by pundits, fearing the dangerous Hamas.
Arab channels, however, see a different outcome. Many have begun referring to
Hamas, once controversial, as simply "the Palestinian resistance".
While American analysts map out Israel's strategy, Arab broadcasters are
drawing their own maps, plotting the expanding range of Hamas rockets, and
predicting a strengthened hand for opposition to Israel, rather than a weakened
one.
Habib Battah is a freelance journalist and media analyst based in Beirut and
New York.
The views expressed by the author are not necessarily those of Al Jazeera.
