Why is the world’s media so inconsistent when reporting on the military occupation in Palestine? When 26 Israelis were killed in bombings this weekend it created a crisis that mobilised the world and saturated the media, while the targeting and killing of hundreds of unarmed Palestinian civilians, a third of them children, and the suffocation by siege of three million is unworthy of attention.
In response to the attacks, United States Secretary of Defence Donald Rumsfeld said: “The only way to defend against terrorists is to go after the terrorists,” which not surprisingly culminated in a helicopter missile attack on Gaza city.
This can only be understood as an endorsement of Israel’s policies of extra-judicial executions and state terrorism, which last week took the life of a senior Hamas leader, put an end to a tacit ceasefire with Hamas and directly triggered the latest round of suicide bombings. It is now clear that the US supports even greater atrocities yet to unfold.
The BBC asked Roelf Meyer, a minister in the last apartheid government, whether he thought the onus was on the Israeli government or the Palestinians to act to end the conflict. Meyer said that only when the apartheid government the side with the power gave up the dream of white rule that South Africa could move forward, and that it was up to Israel the side with the power to end its occupation.
When everyone in the world sees things so clearly, only Ariel Sharon, the US government and the media pretend they do not. Abdullah Vawda, Sandton
The proposed Anti-Terrorism Bill would limit our rights to speech, association and even actions. It will criminalise people based on colour, religion or political association. We don’t need this mentality. Abdullah Vawda, Sandton