The British mainstream media have shamefully fallen silent after reports emerged from Gaza last night confirming that a fellow journalist – who was wearing the iconic ‘PRESS’ vest which clearly marked him out as a reporter – was “deliberately” shot dead by an Israeli sniper whist covering further protests on the Gaza-Israel border last night.
Yaser Murtaja – a Photojournalist with the Gaza-based Ain Media agency – was shot in the stomach by an Israeli sniper, despite wearing a highly visible blue flak jacket clearly marked with the word “press”.
The Palestinian Health Ministry last night confirmed that Mr Murtaja had died of his wounds.
Sources in Gaza have confirmed that journalist Yaser Murtaja has died after being shot in the abdomen by an Israeli sniper while covering the protests. He was clearly wearing a vest that identified him as press. Rest in peace. pic.twitter.com/oKLSBhXiUk
— Liam O'Hare (@Liam_O_Hare) April 6, 2018
Yasser Murtaja, Palestinian photojournalist, was murdered in Gaza today by the Israeli military with a sniper's bullet to the chest. Images from today are too graphic. Remember him as he was; a person who loved life. pic.twitter.com/t5MLDbJSyK
— Yousef Munayyer (@YousefMunayyer) April 7, 2018
https://twitter.com/joed*ke/status/982524076219650050
Added to the brutal murder of Mr Murtaja, the Palestinian journalist syndicate said that seven other reporters were seriously injured by Israeli snipers in yesterday’s protests – in what they described as “deliberate crimes committed by the Israeli army”.
#صور .. لحظة اصابة الصحفي خليل ابوعاذرة، اثناء تغطيته لأحداث #مسيرة_العودة_الكبرى شرق غزة، أمس. pic.twitter.com/OB82uIbNvD
— المركز الفلسطيني للإعلام (@PalinfoAr) April 7, 2018
Mr Murtaja’s tragic death brings the total number of Palestinians now murdered by the Israeli armed forces to at least 31, whilst more than 2,500 have also been seriously injured in total during two major protests on the Gaza border in the last few weeks.
Despite clear violations of international law by using deadly force against unarmed protestors, Western politicians have almost universally failed to call out Israel’s latest crimes against humanity.
Our own Prime Minister Theresa May hasn’t uttered a single word of condemnation against Israel for the brutal murder of numerous Palestinian protestors.
In fact, one of the only major Western politicians to condemn the violence has been, you’ve guessed it, Jeremy Corbyn – who called the killing and wounding by Israeli forces of civilians demonstrating for Palestinian rights in Gaza “appalling“, and called on the UK government to “make its voice heard on the urgency of a genuine settlement for peace and justice“:
The killing and wounding by Israeli forces of civilians demonstrating for Palestinian rights in Gaza is appalling.
The UK Government must make its voice heard on the urgency of a genuine settlement for peace and justice.
— Jeremy Corbyn (@jeremycorbyn) March 31, 2018
But now, with the brutal murder of one Palestinian journalist, and the wounding of seven more – all of whom were clearly wearing vests marked ‘PRESS’ – you would have expected British journalists to at least express solidarity with their fellow reporters.
At the time of publishing, not a single British journalist had expressed their concern, and not a single British media outlet had even reported the brutal killing of a fellow reporter.
The lengths at which the British media will go in order to try and whitewash the crimes of the Israeli government truly are shocking. But when fellow British reporters almost universally fail to condemn these deliberate crimes against members of their own profession, you know we have a serious problem in both our media and our political establishment.
In modern times, the consensus amongst Western politicians has always been pro-Israel and anti-Palestine – and their failure to condemn Israel’s despicable crimes is nothing new. But the failure of fellow journalists to call out the brutal and deliberate murder one of their fellow professionals is beyond disturbing.
What it goes to show is that the majority of Britain’s journalists clearly feel no connection with real reporters such as Yasser Murtaja – a man who gave his life trying to report the reality of the desperate struggle of his people.
The UK’s media has long been a sham – but this latest disgraceful journalistic failure proves that the majority of them aren’t fit to call themselves ‘journalists’ at all – a huge proportion of them are now clearly just propagandist lackeys for our two-faced, moralless, disgustingly backwards Establishment.
