This story is syndicated from The Shield, the newspaper of McCallum High School in Austin, TX. The original version of the story ran here.
If you’ve spent any amount of time online over the past few months, you’re sure to have noticed the ebb and flow of public opinion towards Israel and Gaza following Hamas’ Oct. 7 massacre in Jerusalem, Tel Aviv and the surrounding region.
Ever since, the front pages of news sites have constantly been updated with the latest reports on the destruction caused by the Israeli Defense Force, or IDF’s, indiscriminate airstrikes on the Gaza Strip. Unless you’re nothing short of a complete recluse, you know of not only the psychological, but humanitarian toll the war has taken on what Palestinians have managed to survive the IDF campaign. This has generated such a drastic shift in public opinion that Israel may have nearly managed to entirely squander the initial out pour of goodwill it received, despite being the victim of a tragedy I’ve seen likened to a second Kristallnacht.
Israeli officials have, of course, since maintained what is effectively a policy of total war against Palestine, having already paid back their dead beyond tenfold, as their own reported 1,200 casualties is dwarfed by the current Palestinian death toll of well over 20,000, at least according to the Gaza Health Ministry (a Hamas-backed group). Needless to say, thousands among this presumed death toll were innocent civilians, and thousands more were children at that.
The IDF has excoriated Gaza soil, in pursuit of the seemingly total annihilation of anything that stands in their way, compassion beyond their capacity. According to Israeli President Isaac Herzog, “It’s an entire nation out there that is responsible,” and to Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, “We are fighting human animals, and we act accordingly.”
Eighty-three deceased journalists and media workers have been found in the rubble, says the Committee to Protect Journalists, the accounts of each corroborated by various organizations of differing reliability. Still, even if there are unforeseen falsehoods in as many as a dozen of these reports, a notion I’m skeptical of entertaining, dozens more still stand, and that number isn’t done rising.
This information was especially appalling to me. I’ve regularly considered journalism as a future career path; the field fascinates me due to the freedom often lent to individuals to pursue their interests and in many ways, set their own goals. In a world where too much feels out of our control, journalism is one of the few outlets for professionals to use their jobs to observe the world around them and interpret their own surroundings and existence.
There’s something nauseating about seeing dozens who undoubtedly share this sentiment being wiped out without remorse as part of some brattish display of revenge.
It’s not like most of these people were involved in some sort of war correspondence, either; they were simply caught in the crossfire, same as thousands among their families, friends and colleagues. I, for one, know that if I wanted to see the sorts of things the Palestinian population has had to endure over the past months, I’d have joined the ROTC a long time ago.
This isn’t about supporting dubious Gaza media organizations, and it sure isn’t about supporting Hamas. There’s ample evidence of their mafioso censorship techniques and other unethical practices in the field of journalism and undeniably beyond. I’m discerning bystanders from agents of national interests. I shouldn’t have to explain why the hand you’ve been dealt doesn’t determine your loyalties, let alone your morality.
Indeed, several of the writers and reporters found dead among crumbling buildings and streets were affiliated with media companies and organizations all but confirmed to be under direct Hamas influence. Despite this, though, the fact remains that even if one must face corruption to enter the field, they are not made complicit with the actions of their overseers, à la some asinine transaction of morals.
Sari Mansour, director of Quds News Network, killed in an airstrike on Bureij Refugee Camp with his friend Hassouneh Salim, a freelance photojournalist. Mostafa El Sawaf, a reporter for MSDR news, died when an Israeli airstrike destroyed his home. His wife and two of his sons went with him.
Mossab Ashour, Yaacoub Al-Barsh, Ahmed Fatima, Mohamed Abu Hassira, Iyad Matar; I could fill paragraphs with these names, and the Israel-Hamas War has only lasted about four months so far. For reference, throughout all of World War II, a six-year ordeal, the bloodiest human conflict ever, 69 dead journalists were tallied, astonishingly less than the aforementioned 83 given their respective time scales. You don’t kill that many in a conflict unless you’re trying to, or perhaps worse, simply don’t care.
The documented deaths of journalists function as a microcosm for the IDF response to Oct. 7: families wiped out in an instant; children left without homes, many more orphaned. Even a clueless student such as myself could see that there were numerous steps they could have taken, like the ground operations they eventually resorted to, to mitigate such catastrophes; although maybe that’s giving them too much credit, as that word harbors the implication that all this excess bloodshed was at all accidental. I’ll say this: for a group dedicated to efficiently bringing back hostages and targeting Hamas, they’ve certainly got a penchant for collateral damage.
Just like medical personnel, journalists and obviously civilians are protected by the Geneva Convention, and should under no circumstances be attacked to any measure. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, on top of being an outspoken nationalist, is for all intents and purposes a war criminal for his complicity in these recent atrocities (deploying internationally-controversial chemical weapons against their opponent, immense innocent bloodshed, need I say more?). The fact that I’ve seen no one of political or social prominence outright say this yet is pretty disgusting. Perhaps it has something to do with the fact that we Americans effectively supplied the Israeli government with much of the means to reap all of this carnage, but that’s practically an entire story of its own.
Nevertheless, while it may be easy to conflate the two, remain as cautious in discerning the Israeli people from their government as for their Palestinian counterparts. Just as thousands of innocent dead in Gaza never laid a finger on an Israeli hostage, the same can be said about just as many in Israel who never pulled a trigger or armed a missile. They, although currently more fortunate than the people of Palestine, shouldn’t be blamed for the sins of their officials.
Former President Barack Obama was often criticized by his dissenters for recklessly conducting missile strikes in high population areas, ignoring any civilian casualties thereabout created for the sake of eliminating “terrorists.” I feel it would be hypocritical to overlook such a similarity between the subject of my ridicule and one of my own leaders, so I mention it here to say that it was just as iniquitous there as it is now.
Additionally, none of this is to say that any soldier of Hamas deserves anything short of unbiased justice; each member should be arrested and stand trial for what they did in October, along with their unspeakable treatment of POWs, but there remains no ethically excusable grounds for the IDF’s current purge. After all, they are just as guilty as Netanyahu. It still doesn’t change the fact that those who are heartbroken by the events of Oct. 7 but see the current bombardments as some act of retribution are nothing more than a living, breathing example of prejudice masquerading behind a thin veneer of virtue.
I began writing this story in November, but due to various setbacks, it’s only been published as of now. To my credit, this opinion was quite a bit more subversive back then, although it’s been a comfort to see the trend of public opinion come closer that of my own since then. It’s also, unfortunately, grown into something that stretches far beyond the confines of a single nation, with the conflict now resembling more of an ideological web than a tug of war.
As was so well put in the recent board editorial over this issue, this war is but another event in a long line of hostilities regarding this region and its people. Both sides have hurt the other at some point or another, and as such, sticking with one group encourages ignorance of the other’s suffering. This is usually the case with tribalism, despite how unfortunately pervasive it appears to be.
