Mirror, Mirror, who is the Victim?

Zeinab Daher

While the entire world sympathized with the death of the three year-old Aylan al-Kurdi off the Mediterranean, the exact same world remained silent towards the martyrdom of the 12 year-old Yemeni girl Ishraq al-Muafha whose life was taken last week in a Saudi massacre at the al-Falah Primary School in the District of Nihm.

A schoolbag, a severed limb and an innocent body lying on the desert, is what was left from the young Ishraq. The little girl was a victim of one of the many Saudi massacres that do not receive much condemnation - or at least attention - of the global media, the international public opinion and the world leaders' ‘sympathy'.

The dominant hypocrisy of the mainstream media, the biggest liar influencing public reactions to ongoing developments, is the main cause of injustice practiced against people of Yemen. While militants in Syria are referred to as rebels, the resistance in Yemen conduct ‘attacks' according to media outlets.

The media blackout surrounding the humanitarian situation in Yemen is evidence that children there are the number one victim of the ongoing aggression. Only in the impoverished war-torn Yemen do six children die every hour due to various preventable diseases.

Meanwhile, 9.6 million children are in need of humanitarian and health care and 2.2 million children are suffering from malnutrition, almost all of severe cases.

Besides, 1.8 million of the Yemeni children are, unfortunately, out of school. But wait, perhaps those out of school are luckier than the others. Maybe those deprived from education are likely to be martyred next to their families instead of dying alone on the way back home from school or vice versa, just like the case of Ishraq.

An image of a soulless body, sadly, didn't touch the ‘hearts' of those who claim to defend human rights, and the rights of children and their childhood in particular.

In this regard, Professor of Media in the Faculty of Media and Documentation at the Lebanese University Dr. Abbas Mzannar said to Al-Ahed News in an exclusive interview that "On the level of hiding the news of the Yemeni children, it is a sort of bedimming propaganda in such media war. Such blacking out aims at hiding the humanitarian image that was pretty much activated with media globalization. Media globalization originated at the beginning of the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The humane speech during war there emerged and was being used by NATO, stressing the humanitarian role of power."

Dr. Mzannar further explained that: "The image proved in the wars of the so-called Arab Spring its major role, especially in the presence of the multimedia devices that can reveal the image but can also fake it. As for Yemen, even the very simple images were not circulated; we have always seen destruction but we haven't seen victims and images didn't reflect this flagrant aggression."

The expert in media stressed that Yemen represented a symbolic icon of perseverance and not surrendering to the so-called Arab deterrence, which is in fact American deterrence with Arab coalition and sponsorship.

"The Yemeni example, frankly speaking, is legendary and miraculous. What is going on in Yemen, resisting this flagrant aggression for almost two years, is a giant persistence. The Yemeni people offered enormous patience and persistence and revealed the historic image of the revolutionary Yemen which doesn't surrender. They are trying to break this exemplary image," Dr. Mzannar noted.

He went on to say that in modern history, such a destructive war on infrastructure, children and schools is unprecedented. This blackout of the humanitarian side is to continue the war and destroy this example and try to deter all those who belong to the axis of resistance. They didn't exclude any means to achieve their futile goal in settling their deterrence power. The Yemeni resistance continues, and all what belongs to the humanitarian face, ending the war and the civilians, will remain undercover.

Making clear how much pressure image circulation can exert on the level of stopping a war, or at least reaching a ceasefire agreement, the media professor used the July 2006 ‘Israeli' war on Lebanon as an example: "This had previously happened in the July 2006 war on Lebanon. When the Qana Massacre 2006 came to the surface, a ceasefire immediately took place and the ‘Israelis' were confused. This makes clear how serious the humanitarian side is and the role it plays."

"Even in the Vietnam War, when the images of the American soldiers killed were published, the American people and public opinion moved on the spot, and deterred the war," the man added.

As for now, people, who can play major roles, are being totally misled by globalized media that is controlled by a coalition hostile to the real Islam and all that belongs to the axis of resistance.

"Frankly speaking, there is a lot of images published by the Guardian, the BBC, western and French media, for children supposedly from Syria that turned out to be fake. The images rather belonged to kids from Iraq and Palestine."

Dr. Mzannar stressed that there is deliberate misleading [of public opinion] and an attempt to humanize a war like that in Aleppo, where the humanitarian face is very significant; at the same time, there are counter attempts to totally make absent the aspects of the war on Yemen in favor of continuing the aggression.

Almost two years have passed since the first day of the brutal Saudi aggression, yet the Yemenis are still showing unprecedented resistance, defending their nation and defeating the cruel attacker.

Until then, few are the mirrors that can eye the victim wherever he/she happens to fall, and so many are one-eyed [and] fabricating news, hiding many innocent martyrs, and trumpeting the aggressors' propaganda by showering public opinion with a lot of fake news.

May the souls of all children rest in peace, the victims of terrorism, media bias, hypocrisy and the polishing of the monster's image in the eyes of the world.

Source: Al-Ahed News