Western Media’s Proportionality and the Murder of Journalists in Gaza

Western Media’s Proportionality and the Murder of Journalists in Gaza
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The discourse surrounding the killing of journalists in Gaza by Israel reveals a deeply troubling double standard in Western media, an opinion piece by Clarion India reported. When a BBC reporter questions whether it is “justified to kill five journalists when you were only targeting one,” it suggests a depraved calculus that cheapens the lives of Palestinian media workers. This framing, which has become normalized, implies that there is a degree of acceptable loss.

To highlight this hypocrisy, one only has to imagine a similar scenario involving well-known Western journalists. If five BBC reporters were killed in a strike, and Israel claimed one of them was a Hamas operative, the reaction would be one of righteous indignation. The idea that their lives could be weighed in a “proportionality” equation would be dismissed with contempt. Israel’s flimsy claim against Al-Jazeera journalist Anas al-Sharif—that he was secretly a Hamas commander—would be seen as preposterous if it were applied to a Western journalist. Yet, in this case, it is repeated without critical scrutiny.

This narrative, which legitimizes the murder of journalists, is not an accident. It is, as the argument suggests, a product of a Western media system that serves as a propagandist for a colonial project in the Middle East. It draws a line between the value of a Palestinian life and a Western one. Furthermore, it reflects a broader agenda, where legal and political policies—such as the UK’s Terrorism Act—have replicated Israel’s obscene logic, effectively making any connection, however tenuous, to the governing party in Gaza an excuse to deem a professional, whether a doctor or a journalist, a legitimate target. By accepting and repeating these narratives, Western media and governments have blood on their hands and are complicit in ensuring more journalists are murdered in the future.