{"id":712530,"date":"2022-06-22T12:00:09","date_gmt":"2022-06-22T12:00:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dissidentvoice.org\/?p=130866"},"modified":"2022-06-22T12:00:09","modified_gmt":"2022-06-22T12:00:09","slug":"if-the-media-can-probe-shireen-abu-aklehs-death-why-not-the-murder-of-other-palestinians","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/2022\/06\/22\/if-the-media-can-probe-shireen-abu-aklehs-death-why-not-the-murder-of-other-palestinians\/","title":{"rendered":"If the Media can probe Shireen Abu Akleh\u2019s Death, Why Not the Murder of Other Palestinians?"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The New York Times<\/em> published<\/a> this week the conclusion of its investigation into the killing of the Palestinian-American journalist Shireen Abu Akleh<\/a>.<\/p>\n

It was the fourth major US<\/a> news organisation to look in detail at what happened to Abu Akleh during an Israeli army raid into the Palestinian<\/a> city of Jenin last month.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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The New York Times<\/em> found a high probability she had been killed by an Israeli sniper, confirming the findings<\/a> of earlier investigations by the Associated Press, CNN and the Washington Post<\/em><\/a>. Like the other publications, the Times based its findings on video footage, witness testimonies and acoustic analysis.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe bullet that killed Ms Abu Akleh was fired from the approximate location of the Israeli military convoy [in Jenin], most likely by a soldier from an elite unit,\u201d the Times concluded. A total of 16 shots were fired at the group of journalists that included Abu Akleh.<\/p>\n

Last month, CNN said<\/a> the evidence it unearthed suggested the veteran Al Jazeera journalist had been killed in a \u201ctargeted attack by Israeli forces\u201d. Similar conclusions have been reached<\/a> by human rights groups that have studied the evidence, including Israel\u2019s respected occupation watchdog, B\u2019Tselem.<\/p>\n

A major blow<\/strong><\/p>\n

These probes are a major blow to Israel<\/a>, coming from reputed media organisations that are usually seen as highly sympathetic to Israel rather than the Palestinians.<\/p>\n

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They have kept the killing of the journalist in the headlines when Israel had hoped interest would quickly wane \u2013 as is the case with the overwhelming majority of Palestinian deaths.<\/p>\n

The investigations have made it much harder for Israel to obscure both its responsibility for Abu Akleh\u2019s killing and the intention behind it. The bullet that killed her was fired with the apparent goal of executing her, hitting a narrow, exposed area of flesh between her helmet and a flak jacket marked \u201cPress\u201d.<\/p>\n

And the various probes have highlighted once again how unwilling Israel is to hold its soldiers to account<\/a> for committing crimes if the victim is Palestinian.<\/p>\n

Instead, Israel has had to twist and turn in defending its failure to identify the culprit. It initially refused<\/a> to investigate, claiming a Palestinian gunman, not one of its soldiers, shot Abu Akleh during the military raid.<\/p>\n

All the media investigations show that to be untrue.<\/p>\n

Then Israel\u00a0suggested<\/a> that she might have been hit by the crossfire from an Israeli soldier being fired on by Palestinian gunmen. But all the investigations have shown that Palestinian fighters were nowhere near Abu Akleh when she was shot. She was, however, clearly visible to a unit of Israeli soldiers.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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More recently, Israel has tried to shift the blame onto the Palestinian Authority, saying<\/a> it has not cooperated by handing over the bullet that killed Abu Akleh or by agreeing to hold a joint investigation.\u00a0As ever, Israel behaves as if the party accused of the crime should be the one to oversee the investigation.<\/p>\n

The Palestinian Authority rightly refuses<\/a> requests for cooperation, arguing that they are being made in bad faith. Israel would exploit any joint investigation to concoct \u201ca new lie, a new narrative\u201d, the PA observes.<\/p>\n

A meaningful question<\/strong><\/p>\n

In reality, Israel already knows exactly which of its snipers pulled the trigger. The only meaningful question at this stage is, why? Was the shooting committed by a hot-headed soldier, or was it an execution carried out on orders from above? Was the intention to target Abu Akleh specifically, or did it not matter which of the group of journalists she was among was hit?<\/p>\n

Israel, however, isn\u2019t the only party discomfited by the media\u2019s repeated investigations.<\/p>\n

They have also served to embarrass Joe Biden\u2019s administration. Antony Blinken, the US secretary of state, has\u00a0called<\/a> for an \u201cindependent, credible investigation\u201d,\u00a0while his department has underscored<\/a> the need for a \u201cthorough and independent investigation\u201d.<\/p>\n

The New York Times<\/em> and the other major media outlets have all proved that just such an investigation can be carried out. And yet the silence from the US administration at their shared findings is deafening.<\/p>\n

There are two further, possibly less obvious conclusions the rest of us should draw from these efforts to identify who was responsible for killing Abu Akleh.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

The first relates to the exceptional nature of the investigations conducted by the US media. Concern at the killing of a Palestinian is far from the norm. In this case, it appears to have been prompted by an unusual coincidence of facts: that Abu Akleh was a high-profile, internationally respected journalist and that she had US citizenship.<\/p>\n

In other words, she was seen not just as any ordinary Palestinian, or even as a Palestinian journalist, but as one of the western media\u2019s own.<\/p>\n

Total impunity<\/strong><\/p>\n

In murdering Abu Akleh, Israel reminded journalists at the New York Times<\/em>, AP, CNN and the Washington Post<\/em> that the lives of their correspondents covering Israel and Palestine are in more danger than they possibly appreciate. In killing her, Israel crossed a red line for the western media \u2013 one premised on self-interest and self-preservation.<\/p>\n

There are parallels with the media\u2019s special treatment <\/a>of the killing of\u00a0Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi<\/a> \u2013 and for similar reasons. Khashoggi, who was working for the Washington Post<\/em>, was murdered and his body dismembered during a visit to the Saudi embassy in Turkey<\/a>.<\/p>\n

As with Israel, Saudi Arabia<\/a>\u2018s leadership has an appalling human rights record and is not hesitant to jail and kill its opponents. But Khashoggi\u2019s murder provoked unprecedented outrage from the media \u2013 outrage that Saudi Arabia\u2019s many other victims have never warranted.<\/p>\n

The fact is the US media could have conducted similar investigations into any number of Palestinian deaths at the hands of the Israeli security services, not just Abu Akleh\u2019s, and they would have reached similar conclusions. But they have consistently avoided doing so.<\/p>\n

There is a danger inherent in focusing exclusively on Abu Akleh\u2019s killing, just as there was with focusing exclusively on Khashoggi\u2019s. Each has the effect of making it look as though their deaths are exceptional events requiring exceptional investigation \u2013 when they are each an example of a longstanding pattern of regime lawlessness and human rights abuses.<\/p>\n

The special focus subtly reinforces too the impression that Palestinian accounts of Israeli abuses, even when the supporting evidence is overwhelming, cannot be trusted.<\/p>\n

The veteran Israeli journalist Gideon Levy has run a weekly column, the Twilight Zone<\/a>, in the Haaretz<\/em> newspaper for years in which he investigates the killing or serious wounding of Palestinians \u2013 often people whose names have never appeared in the western media.<\/p>\n

Invariably he finds<\/a> that Israel\u2019s military lies \u2013 sometimes flagrantly \u2013 about the circumstances in which Palestinians have been killed, or it initiates an inconclusive, stone-walling investigation.<\/p>\n

The lies are needed because the truth would show something consistently ugly about Israel\u2019s decades of military occupation: that Israeli soldiers often kill <\/a>unarmed Palestinians in cold blood;\u00a0or that they recklessly shoot<\/a> Palestinian bystanders;\u00a0or that they execute<\/a> armed Palestinian fighters when no one\u2019s life is in danger.<\/p>\n

The common thread in Levy\u2019s reports is the complete impunity of Israeli soldiers, whatever their actions.<\/p>\n

Pilloried in public<\/strong><\/p>\n

But there is a further conclusion to be drawn. Blinken and the Biden administration keep insisting<\/a> on a thorough, independent, credible and transparent investigation, and say it is important to \u201cfollow the facts, wherever they lead\u201d.<\/p>\n

But who do they expect to carry out such an investigation?<\/p>\n

The White House, of course, reflexively discounts <\/a>the findings of the Palestinian Authority\u2019s investigation that Abu Akleh was deliberately shot by Israeli soldiers.\u00a0It acts as if the investigations conducted by these four large media organisations do not qualify. Meanwhile, the administration itself\u00a0shows precisely zero interest<\/a> in conducting an investigation, despite pressure from Congress to involve the FBI.<\/p>\n

Would Blinken prefer that the United Nations take on the task? Presumably not, given how the US and Israel responded<\/a> to the last major independent investigation by the UN, one into Israel\u2019s month-long attack on Gaza at the end of 2008. Israel refused to cooperate.<\/p>\n

Richard Goldstone, a distinguished South African jurist, led a panel of experts<\/a>\u00a0who concluded that Israel had committed a series of war crimes during its attack, known as Cast Lead, as had Palestinian militias.<\/p>\n

The UN panel\u2019s report found that Israel had adopted a policy that intentionally targeted Palestinian civilians, the vast majority of the 1,400 Palestinians killed in Cast Lead.<\/p>\n

Both the US and Israel worked strenuously to bury the report. Goldstone, who is Jewish, found himself publicly shamed and isolated by Jewish communities in the US and South Africa. He was even barred<\/a> from attending his grandson\u2019s bar mitzvah.\u00a0Eventually, he appeared to succumb to the pressure campaign, expressing regret<\/a> over the report.<\/p>\n

No one in Washington came to Goldstone\u2019s defence over the UN\u2019s thorough, independent, credible and transparent investigation. Quite the reverse: he was publicly pilloried. The US administration thereby sent a message to other experts that investigating \u201cindependently\u201d and \u201ccredibly\u201d is certain only to bring ignominy on their heads if it exposes Israel\u2019s war crimes.<\/p>\n

Israel\u2019s hands \u2018tied\u2019<\/strong><\/p>\n

Or maybe Blinken would prefer that the International Criminal Court <\/a>at the Hague investigate.<\/p>\n

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And yet the US demonstrated the degree to which it appreciates full, independent, credible and transparent investigations by that body two years ago, when the ICC tried to turn the spotlight on to US war crimes in Afghanistan <\/a>and Israel\u2019s<\/a> in the occupied Palestinian territories.<\/p>\n

In response, Biden\u2019s predecessor, Donald Trump<\/a>, imposed sanctions on the court, denying staff entry to the US and threatening to seize its assets. The threat extended<\/a> to anyone offering \u201cmaterial support\u201d to the court \u2013 language more normally used in the context of terrorism.<\/p>\n

The reality, as all parties understand, is that only an investigation overseen by Israel could ever count as \u201cthorough, independent, credible and transparent\u201d to the US.<\/p>\n

The subtext is that an investigation cannot hope to reach the bar of \u201ccredible, independent and transparent\u201d, as far as Washington is concerned, until the Palestinian Authority agrees to hold a joint inquiry with Israel.<\/p>\n

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But both Israel and the US know full well that the Palestinian leadership will never agree to such \u201ccooperation\u201d \u2013 because Israel\u2019s role would not be to arrive at the truth but to engineer a cover-up.<\/p>\n

The demand for a \u201ccredible, independent and transparent\u201d investigation is the US administration\u2019s code for an investigation that will never take place. It is the diplomatic equivalent of the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.<\/p>\n

But more importantly, it is the kind of impossible investigation that, conveniently for the US and Israel, they can blame the PA for obstructing. As long as the Palestinians refuse to \u201ccooperate\u201d, Israel\u2019s hands are supposedly tied.<\/p>\n

Abu Akleh\u2019s murder has not just revealed the fact that Israeli soldiers kill Palestinians, any Palestinian, with impunity.<\/p>\n

It has revealed too that the Biden administration is not troubled by the killing, or by the impunity of the soldier who executed her. All that bothers the White House is the irritant of having to create the impression it cares about the truth and the impression that Israel is doing its best to investigate.<\/p>\n

Until the matter can be swept aside, it will be a little harder for each to get on with business as usual: for the US to give Israel full-throated financial, diplomatic and military support; and for Israel to continue its incremental, decades-long work of seizing control of the Palestinians\u2019 entire, historic homeland.<\/p>\n

But at least for each of them, with Abu Akleh gone, there is one less fearless witness to expose quite how hollow their moral posturing is.<\/p>\n

\u2022 First published in\u00a0Middle East Eye<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>The post If the Media can probe Shireen Abu Akleh\u2019s Death, Why Not the Murder of Other Palestinians?<\/a> first appeared on Dissident Voice<\/a>.\n

This post was originally published on Dissident Voice<\/a>. <\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The New York Times published this week the conclusion of its investigation into the killing of the Palestinian-American journalist Shireen Abu Akleh. It was the fourth major US news organisation to look in detail at what happened to Abu Akleh during an Israeli army raid into the Palestinian city of Jenin last month. The New [\u2026]<\/p>\n

The post If the Media can probe Shireen Abu Akleh\u2019s Death, Why Not the Murder of Other Palestinians?<\/a> first appeared on Dissident Voice<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":32,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[82,747,48640,36,1233],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/712530"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/32"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=712530"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/712530\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":712531,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/712530\/revisions\/712531"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=712530"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=712530"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=712530"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}