Media in denial over why terror attacks happening in the West
Once again, we are reminded of our vulnerability due to the latest terror attack in London. Once again, we are bombarded on the airwaves, TV screens and in newspapers, the Irish Independent included, with extensive coverage of the victims, the timeline of events and the perpetrator’s background and alleged motives, a quite understandable response in many respects.
However, like with previous terror attacks in France, Belgium and Germany, the media coverage is striking in two aspects. Firstly its lack of analysis on the root causes of terrorism and secondly its imbalance when compared to the coverage of terror attacks in those parts of the world in which the major world powers are the prime purveyors of terrorism.
Military air strikes, artillery bombardments, small weapons fire and suicide bombings throughout the Middle East, kill and maim men, women and children on a daily basis. These events, if reported at all, are now usually buried in small columns deep in the middle pages. Scores of women and children were killed two weeks ago in a double suicide bombing at a wedding in a village near Tikrit in Iraq. Hundreds were killed in Syria last week. Many are yet to be killed, under US President Donald Trump’s influence in the wars of the Middle East, and thousands were killed under Barack Obama’s drone strikes.
Last week was the 14th anniversary of the disastrous US-led invasion of Iraq. Fourteen years later, the Middle East and the wider region is a cauldron of violent instability, sectarian strife and open territory for perpetual and proxy warfare by imperial powers. Meanwhile, Western governments and the media are in denial about why terror attacks have increased in Western cities.
It is time to heed the words of US intellectual Noam Chomsky, who noted that the best way to stop terrorism is to “stop participating in it”. All the victims of terrorism, wherever in the world, deserve no less. Jim Roche PRO, Irish Anti-War Movement, PO Box 9260, Dublin 1