The West and its double standards

I don’t recall any European expressing grief over the number of Iraqis who are being regularly killed by extremists

The terrorist attacks in Paris in which 129 people lost their lives were indeed very tragic. But so was the mid-air explosion of the Russian Flight 9268 over Egypt in which 224 people lost their lives. The Islamic State (IS) claimed responsibility for both events. There was, however, a difference in the way the West reacted to the two episodes. The gunning down and bombing of French citizens in a suburb of Paris was regarded as a greater tragedy than the loss of Russian citizens in the mid-air explosion of the A321.

Perhaps, this was because air crashes are taking place more frequently than they did in the past. Besides, international news channels can do little more than repeatedly show debris lying on the ground. In the case of the Russian aircraft, the focus was on a part of the fuselage which resembled a half-opened tin of Portuguese sardines. There is little scope for evoking a sense of outrage or horror here; but the Gallic calamity which encompassed several locations provided infinite scope for the cameras while correspondents coughed up human interest stories.

As predicted, David Cameron displayed profound sympathy and grief over the tragedy that took place in the Parisian suburb and demonstrated solidarity. He announced that the British parliament would observe a one-minute silence as a mark of respect for the victims of the Paris bombings. French President Francois Hollande swore revenge and said France was now at war. Vladimir Putin said he would hunt for the people behind the targeted killing of the Russian tourists and would not rest until he destroyed them.

The US Secretary of State, John Kerry, then jumped into the fray and outdid the others in rhetoric. Kerry, who is expected to be in three places at the same time, sounded as if he was still recovering from jet lag. After expressing profound concern at what had happened in the city of lights, he described the IS as a psychopathic monster that raped and tortured people, mostly civilians. He added that the IS killed Yazidis because they were Yazidi, Christians because they were Christian and Shias because they were Shia, suggesting that there might have been other arcane reasons for terminating their temporal existence. He expressed sorrow over the killings in Lebanon and Iraq, and pointed out that the conflict was between civilisation and barbarism.

I don’t recall anybody in Europe ever expressing profound grief over the loss of Russian lives or the number of Iraqis who are being regularly killed in their own country by extremist forces. A blogger from Baghdad, Ali al-Makhzomy, stated that his friends were shocked and angry when he expressed sympathy with the Parisians when he had not mentioned the attacks that are taking place almost on a daily basis in Baghdad. Al-Makhzomy had unintentionally dipped into the reservoir of anger and frustration of his countrymen who see pronounced double standards in the West. “The world unites in outrage and sympathy when the Islamic State kills Westerners, but pays little attention to the near-daily atrocities it carries out in the Middle East.”

The day before the Paris attacks, twin suicide bombers targeted a southern Beirut suburb, killing at least 43 people, and the following day another suicide bomber struck a funeral in Iraq, killing at least 21 civilians. Both attacks featured in major media outlets, but generated little interest outside the region.

Bombings in Baghdad, which mainly target the security forces and the country’s Shiite majority, killed an average of more than 90 civilians a month last year, according to a UK-based group that documents civilian deaths in Iraq. The IS has now posted a video in which covetous eyes have been cast on New York. Well, that’s Mr Obama’s problem. He will know what to say.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 22^nd, 2015.

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