Equal hearing: pro-Israeli hawks are louder in U.S. government, media, but some Jews decry suffering on both sides - Television

National Catholic Reporter, May 3, 2002 by Raymond A. Schroth

There's an old borscht-belt joke, in the genre of self-deprecating ethnic humor no longer in style, where in the punch line a grandmother deals with every family, social and political problem by posing the ultimate question: "But is it good for the Jews?"

An old gag with new relevance as we have watched the media report on Israel's invasion of the Palestinian towns and on Palestinian fanatics who respond by blowing themselves up and taking innocent Jews with them.

In a democratic society, the first obligation of the press is to inform the public so that the people can say yes or no to what their representatives are doing in their names, So when we pick up the morning paper or turn on the TV, Jewish and Palestinian voices would get an equal hearing.

Does this happen?

On April 10, Samah Jabr, a Palestinian doctor and peace activist, sponsored by the St. Peter's College Peace and Justice program, stood before the biggest crowd I have seen in our auditorium, with students and faculty standing against the walls, to give voice to the Palestinian cause. Ours is the most diverse student body in New Jersey, and perhaps in the United States, and our neighborhood is Muslim, Philippine, Hispanic and black; so her audience was attuned to what she had to say.

She began with a slide show, with music accompaniment and sarcastic subtitles, depicting Israeli soldiers abusing Palestinian men, women and children. Followed by a segment that drew a parallel between the Nazi persecution of Jews in the Warsaw Ghetto and Jewish treatment of Arabs on the West Bank. A dead Jewish baby then; a dead Palestinian baby today.

The text: Just as Jews were persecuted, so are Palestinians. The subtext: World War II's Nazis have reappeared as today's lsraelis.

During the question period, I said I agreed that Israel's policy of driving their tanks into the Palestinians' cities was oppressive and immoral but that I was still waiting to hear the Arab intellectual community, with one voice, condemn the immoral madness of the suicide bombings (smattering of applause).

She replied that she did not approve of the bombings, but that the bombers acted as individuals, and that the Israeli occupation was the "greenhouse" of terrorism. A neighbor in the audience said that he could understand a bomber who was ready to die and "wanted to take some of them with him." Arab young women in the second row greeted this with wild applause and started passing out a Time magazine article called "Why We Blow Ourselves Up."

I got the mike and asked the students if that's what they believed. One said, no but, "an eye for an eye ..." Consternation and murmurs in the house. Next question.

My problem is this: Every human life is sacred, and the people who wage wars -- from Arafat to Sharon to Rumsfeld to Bush -- do everything they can to deny that fact. If they acknowledged this obligation, their freedom of movement, their political hands, would be tied.

To achieve their purposes they must dehumanize the enemy by labeling them "terrorists" or "oppressors," so the corpses blown to pieces at a bar mitzvah in Tel Aviv and the Palestinian dead bodies in the rubble of Jenin -- some reported to be already buried by Israeli troops -- cannot be seen as persons.

The Israelis barred the press from Jenin for 10 days, giving themselves carte blanche to dispose of their enemies in any way they chose. The Israeli spokesman tells CNN that about 100 terrorists have been killed plus perhaps a few civilians whom the terrorists used as human shields. A French TV crew gets in and films a half-dozen civilian corpses still rotting in the rubble of their own homes. The New York Times interviews Palestinian young men who, they say, have nothing to do with the war but are labeled "terrorists," stripped naked, photographed, brutalized, and held in detention for days. Jenin residents say they have lost 500 men, women and children.

Will the media, which have been slow to face the issue of the civilian casualties in Afghanistan, demand a full accounting of the victims of Israel's blitzkrieg in Arab towns?

A weekend of radio and TV news and talk April 11-13 offered little hope. On NPR's "The Connection," an opponent of the new International Criminal Court said the United States must resist the court lest it indict Israel for its invasion of the West Bank. Some of CNN's "Capital Gang," such as Mark Shields, criticized Sharon for destroying the Palestinian infrastructure so it would be impossible for them to establish a viable state; then the "Gang" gave a lot of time to the Christian Coalition's Ralph Reed, who is not really a "newsmaker of the week," to argue that it is God's will for Israel to have all that land.

CNN ran videos of young Palestinian women announcing they will blow themselves up. MSNBC ran a group discussion with both Jews and Palestinians; then a feature on a beautiful Israeli teenager who had hoped to be a model but whose face was disfigured by a suicide bomber.

On ABC's "This Week," aside from an interview with Jordan's King Abdullah, none of the five pundits spoke for the Palestinian cause. For William Kristol, Bush's mild caution to Sharon showed he had "lost his moral compass." On "Meet the Press," Condoleezza Rice talked nonstop for 30 minutes, brushing off Tim Russert's point that Sharon had ignored Bush's April 8 demand to withdraw his troops "right away."