Why it matters:
Because it never matters. It does not matter for those who do not want their routine comfort to get disturbed, lest their aiding the mother would finish in their discomfort.
What we're hearing:
"They martyred my husband before my eyes. They severed my son's leg. I tied it with my scarf and carried him in my arms for four kilometers… but he too passed away. I did everything I could, even my scarf served the purpose… but the Arabs of the region did not help us as much as the blood-soaked scarf on my head."
But, when a mother's scarf cries a louder voice than hundreds of media, how can the world justify its silence?
Context:
Gaza
The big picture:
On the other side of the globe, in the Western luxurious crystal towers, a blond man in an expensive suit stands in front of cameras.
- His wife, with a face exposed every day in fashion journals, builds a line beside him with the children dressed in designer outfits, like beautiful dolls, twirling in front of the camera.
- The cameras are meticulously adjusted to smooth out any unwanted crease, brighten every shadow, and represent an idealized image of a perfect family.
- Lighting and angling are all precisely set in order to conceal the hollowness behind the lavish portrait.
But on the other side of the world, in Gaza, beneath the rubble, a Palestinian mother with a blood-soaked scarf places a final kiss on the forehead of her beloved son martyred. With the very scarf, she had tied his severed leg and carried him for four kilometers …
State of the play:
And more tragic is that not only the international media but the region's outlets have turned a blind eye to the naked truth.
And the boastful Persian-language media, based in the U.K. and the U.S., that are round-the-clock whitewashing the Israeli genocide in Gaza.
And biased wordings, neutral headlines, and misleading analyses are all means they use to reverse the oppressor and oppressed, lest the mass hear the cries of the Palestinian mother.
Still, some Arab media have buried their voice in a treacherous silence. Neither reaction nor objection nor a narrative in support of their brothers and sisters in Gaza. It is as if the massacre of a Muslim community is a piece of information free from news values. It is as if "over 50,000" is just a number.
What next:
The cameras were off, but not out of failure; they were off because of the will to ignore the truth.
The Western journalists were the ones very boastful of their mission, but they preferred to stand in Zionism's propaganda front and chortle and walk instead of standing beside the oppressed.
Between the lines:
Let's see again! On the one side a family as a tool of the media and power and on the other side a family that is the forgotten victim of the history and between the two, the media that did not stand for the victim but played the role of the complicit in tyranny by silence, by falsification, by betrayal.
Not only did they remain silent, but they also washed the tyrants' hands stained.
The bottom line:
What do you think? Which frame is finally supposed to awaken the world? For which of the media should the world feel ashamed? And when the time arrives to cry loud against the silence?
From a note by Iranian Journalist Ardeshir Zabilozadeh
seyed mohammad kazemi
