Double standard about deaths in the Middle East

by Ray Hanania

17 May 2004

Maybe we are too used to death and destruction in the Middle East. Or maybe it is a racist attitude that decides which deaths are more outrageous than the other.

In April, for example, more than 61 Palestinians were killed, according to several Palestinian sources including the Palestine Red Crescent Society. Of those deaths, 15 were children.

During the same period, far fewer Israelis were killed, yet the focus is on Israel's right to defend itself. It seems to me that it is the Palestinians who need to defend themselves, if you base the issue on who is dying faster.

But I live in America, where I know attitudes about the Mideast conflict are not driven by reason and are instead driven by emotion, racism, ethnic and religious differences, too.

Who the victims are determines the level of outrage and concern.

Americans concern themselves mostly with Israeli deaths, in part because Palestinian voices in this country are silenced either through exclusion or by being labeled "anti-Semitic."

In addition to a clear bias toward Israel, Americans, especially in leadership positions and in the media, have what I like to term as a limited moral compassion when it comes to death in the Middle East. That means the gravity of the outrage is based on the ethnicity, religion and national origin of the victims.

We saw that recently in the ongoing violence in the Iraq war. Days after the first photos of American abuses of Iraqi prisoners were publicized in America, supporters of the war were saying the images of brutality, sexual assault and even murder did not represent America at all.

In fact, President Bush said, "Their treatment does not reflect the nature of the American people. That's not the way we do things in America."

Bush is correct in one respect. All the abuses and alleged murders didn't take place in America at all, but occurred only in prisons in Iraq.

That changed when freelance contractor Nicholas Berg was brutally murdered and beheaded by captors allegedly linked to al-Qaida.

In that instance, the reaction was different. Speaking for President Bush, White House spokesman Scott McClellan told reporters, "this shows the true nature of the enemies of freedom. They have no regard for the lives of innocent men, women and children."

It is not our true nature, but it is "their" true nature.

Generally, supporters of Israel either avoid discussing the civilians and the children who are killed by Israeli soldiers who attack and invade Palestinian cities and villages, or they argue that the civilians die because the "terrorists" use them as "shields."

Israeli supporters never admit to anything. They never acknowledge they helped cause the current conflict or express remorse for the innocent deaths; maybe in their minds, there is no such thing as an innocent dead Palestinian.

And maybe that is why we have this conflict, because the only voices denouncing violence on both sides consistently and loudly are voices from Palestinians like myself.

I know some Palestinians have done terrible things to Israelis, but you never hear a defender of Israel's government acknowledge Israelis have done terrible things to Palestinians.

This imbalance, in part, is one reason why the conflict continues and why innocent people on both sides continue to die.

That's the real shame.