Since
then, the Israelis have exerted massive efforts to market and circulate their
idioms, which are being used today by Arab senior officials and in Arab
media—with the Israeli occupying army becoming the only source of news about
Palestinians being killed by the army or by the settlers. During the last 10
years, Israeli occupying forces have killed American woman Rachel Couri, British
journalists David Miller and Tom Hurrendale, and humiliated, beaten and
imprisoned others in order to deter international media from reaching the
occupied territories to the extent that hardly any international media was in
Gaza during the terrible Israeli war on Gaza in December-January 2009. Even
after the so-called ceasefire, Israeli occupying forces continue to kill
Palestinians every day and arrest tens of them, and cast the news in a way to
give the impression that those were dangerous to Israel’s security or that
killing them was a reaction to their violent deeds. Even when they kill a
student such as the young woman Basma Al Nadiri (16), with her school bag on her
back, they announce that she was suspected of carrying explosives. That is not
to mention the 320 Palestinians who died in the last three years because they
were prevented from leaving Gaza to receive treatment outside. Even this simple
information is not easy to get in international media, not to mention analysing
it and writing about the violation it constitutes of the Geneva Conventions and
the international humanitarian law.
That
is why Israeli officials, such as Israel Katz, dare to call for penalising the
Palestinians even further in Gaza, while Lieberman threatens Palestinians with a
nuclear bomb without being condemned by the “international community” or the
“free press” of the Western world—who keep raging about the Korean and
Iranian nuclear programmes. Due to the blockade that Israel has imposed on the
Palestinians, isolating them from the rest of the world, and to the virtual
absence of Arab terms of reference regarding an alternative terminology, idioms,
language or news we are left with is a media that is totally irrelevant to the
reality
of
the Arab-Israeli conflict and its future horizons.
A
case in point is Netanyahu’s statement to President Barack Obama’s special
envoy to the Middle East George Mitchell, that “Israel expects the
Palestinians to first recognise Israel as a Jewish State before talking about
two states for two peoples”. How could the Palestinians establish their own
state once they recognise Israel as a Jewish state on their own lands after they
were killed and turned into refugees on their own soil by settlers who came to
erase the indigenous inhabitants of this land?
What
is the meaning of the phrase used by many senior Europeans and American
officials: to establish “two states” in light of the fact that one state is
established by military force and is expanding by the day to the extent of
undermining the possibility of establishing the Palestinian state.
The
phrase “the two-state solution” aims to mislead and give the impression as
if both Israelis and Palestinians are waiting to establish their states, once
again equating the aggressor with the victim, while the reality is that contrary
to the UN resolution 194 one state is eating up the land, history, water,
and
the very existence of the other
“The
Palestinians”.
The
political language of officials and experts concentrate on the security and well
being of Israel, while only focusing on persons on the other side: Arafat,
Abbas, Fayad in total negligence of the Palestinian people and their future.
The
Economist Magazine (April, 9th, 2009) discussed “genocide” in
Rwanda although that took place 15 years ago but no mention was made of the no
less terrible genocide in Palestine.
When
is the Arab media going to pay attention to this issue and devote resources,
time and effort to address this extremely important aspect of the Arab-Israeli
conflict? This aspect has become an essential part of our battle to restore our
rights: this media battle is not impossible to win as we are the original owners
of the land, and as our rights are recognised and supported by international
legitimacy, and as we are the ones who invented the alphabets and taught the
world how to write. This could be the most logical entry to drive the world to
take a fair stand towards our rights. We only need the will to win the media
over again to support justice instead of massacres.
Dr
Bouthaina Shaaban is Minister, Political and Media Adviser at the Syrian
Presidency