Wrong way around

There seems to be a trend these days to turn things on their head.

Your recent headline “Threat of retaliation by Islamic Jihad ‘is not over yet’” (November 2) is but one example. Since the first action in this story was the building of an attack tunnel from the Gaza Strip into Israeli territory, the headline surely should have read not “retaliation by Islamic Jihad,” but “escalation.”

It was Israel that was retaliating to an attack on its sovereign territory. The headline as it stands implies a first-strike by Israel, lacking any provocation, which is not the case. The attack against Israel has yet to be discussed, let alone condemned, by the United Nations, but as usual, we should not hold our breath.

There are endless examples of this trend these days regarding Europe, where it is known that hundreds of western Europeans have returned from fighting for Islamic State in Syria. So far, but a handful have been brought before a court of law, and very few have been convicted of any crimes despite evidence being available. By comparison, ousted Catalonian president Carles Puigdemont faces the possibility of a 30-year prison sentence for so-called “rebellion.” His crime was to allow Catalonians to vote in a referendum on independence, a vote deemed illegal by Spain.

In recent decades, there has been much store placed in “self-determination” by the European Union, but now, as Spanish police fire rubber bullets at voters in the streets, no prospect of intervention or help is on the horizon. Millions of Europeans died in recent centuries to be able to hold free and open elections and not to have to live under the yoke of despots and dictators.

I’m at a loss to understand how people who have most likely committed crimes against humanity get off scot-free while an act of civil disobedience earns the perpetrators draconian prison sentences. It seems that a lot of people are getting their priorities the wrong way around. ROBERT HICKINBOTHAM Tel Aviv