Different yardsticks: Western media’s coverage of hospital bombings in Gaza and Kiev

By Humaira Ahad

Eight-month-old Noor is lying restless in her cradle, with tears trickling down her chubby cheeks. Her mother Asma appears unfazed, glued to her phone, looking both angry and sad.

“I feel a knot in my throat. Does the white skin of Ukrainians make them superior? Are the Gazans children of a lesser God? How can the Western media brazenly practice this racism,” she asks.

The young woman is referring to the blatant disparity in Western media’s coverage of an attack on a hospital in Kyiv and reporting of Israel’s attacks on hospitals and other civilian infrastructure in Gaza.

Asma left her dream job with a major media conglomerate in London after witnessing their biased coverage of Gaza. Many like Asma have accused Western media of practicing 'colonizer journalism'.

Western media has been dehumanizing the East for centuries, said Sonia, a Palestinian activist and teacher based in France.

“In his book, ‘A Dying Colonialism’ French political philosopher Franz Fanon writes about the dehumanization of Algerians(Algeria was a French colony 1830-1962) by western media reports. ‘Hordes of vital statistics’, ‘hysterical masses’ and ‘children who seem to belong to nobody’, are the phrases that the Western media used for the people of Algeria," she stated,

She noted that the process of dehumanization has not ended and “now a clear example is visible in Gaza, the way Palestine is being reported by West’s media is shocking.”

Western media outlets have been brazenly whitewashing Israeli genocidal crimes against Palestinians in Gaza. News websites have been publishing unsubstantiated claims and perpetuating blatant lies to justify Israel’s genocide and even descending so low to portray victims as villains.

Media experts say Western journalists have been “mediating” the war to manufacture consent.

“It is journalism done by practitioners from colonizing countries who take pride in their imperial conquests and have an elevated sense of self, every fiber nurtured by centuries of predatory accumulation of wealth, knowledge and privilege,” said Vidya Krishnan, an investigative journalist.

“At this late hour, as war rages and children starve and Israel is tried for “plausible genocide”, it is crucial to point at the blood in the hands of Western journalists,” Krishnan wrote in an article.

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Blatant double standards – comparing headlines

On July 8, Ukrainian authorities claimed that Russia struck a children's hospital in the capital Kiev with a missile, killing two adults and wounding seven children.

Russia denied the allegation, saying that Ukrainian anti-missile fire, not Moscow, had hit the hospital.

Here’s how prominent Western media outlets reported the strike on the Ukrainian hospital.

Children's hospital hit as Russian strikes kill dozens in Ukraine

BBC

Ukrainian children’s hospital attacked as Russian strikes on cities kill at least 43

CNN

No words for this’: horror over Russian bombing of Kyiv children’s hospital

The Guardian

Russia Strikes Children’s Hospital in Deadly Barrage Across Ukraine

New York Times

In a Kyiv Hospital, Children Pay the Price of Russia’s Invasion

Wall Street Journal

Kremlin tries to cover its tracks in Kyiv children's hospital bombing

Voice of America

Western news outlets categorically mentioned Russia as the perpetrator of the crime even when there was no clinching evidence to prove it and Moscow clearly denied the allegation.

On the contrary, the same media has been downplaying the Israeli regime's abhorrent crimes in Gaza while portraying victims as villains, even though all evidence points to direct Israeli complicity.

Here are some headlines in Western news outlets obfuscating facts about a series of massacres in Gaza, pushing the narrative of Israel's so-called "right to self-defense."

Israeli strike on Gaza school kills 16, say Palestinian officials

The Guardian

Israeli strike on UN school in Gaza reportedly kills at least 35

BBC

Israeli airstrike kills at least 27 people at school complex near Khan Younis, Gaza Health Ministry says

CNN

Israel Calls on Civilians to Leave Gaza City After Deadly Strike on School Building in South

Wall Street Journal

Carnage at Gaza School Compound Adds to Mounting Death Toll at U.N. Buildings

The New York Times

Israeli strike kills 16 at Gaza school, military says it targeted gunmen

Voice of America

Pressure Mounts as Israel Combs Through Gaza Hospital for Hamas’s Presence

The New York Times

Obscuring the reality, these news websites have made deliberate and conscious efforts to avoid mentioning Israel as a clear offender and perpetrator of genocidal crimes against Palestinians.

Western media does not stop here but goes a step forward to defend Israel’s violations of international and humanitarian law and plays a significant role in protecting the regime from international scrutiny.

The phrases like, “Gaza health ministry says” while mentioning the death toll of Palestinians or “the military says targeted gunmen,” when the regime attacks Palestinians, or “the Hamas presence” when Israel conducts raids on hospitals are intentionally done to deceive the readers and exonerate Israel from its war crimes in Gaza.

This impunity is being granted to Israel while nearly 16,000 children have been killed by the regime in Gaza, more than the total number of children killed around the world in four years.

'Save the Children' recently reported that up to 21,000 Palestinian children are missing in Gaza, with many trapped beneath rubble, detained by Israeli forces or buried in unmarked graves.

And, according to the prestigious British medical journal Lancet, the number of casualties from the Israeli regime’s war on the Gaza Strip is much more than being reported.

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Western leaders- perpetrators of double standards

The US, UK, Canada, France and other Western countries were quick to denounce the strike on a children's hospital in the Ukrainian capital Kyiv, while they have consistently looked the other way as Israel presses ahead with its genocidal war on Gaza, massacring children, women and men.

“This is abhorrent. Striking a children’s hospital, and the innocent children inside, cannot be justified. My heart goes out to the families who are grieving, and Canada’s commitment to Ukraine remains as strong as ever,” Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau condemned the Ukrainian attack on X.

While Israel has been bombing nearly all hospitals in Gaza, Ottawa said that “Canada refuses to acknowledge any of Israel's military actions in Gaza as constituting war crimes,” including numerous attacks on hospitals, which have rendered almost every hospital in the territory defunct.

Following Israel’s October bombing of the al Ahli Baptist Hospital in Gaza which killed hundreds of Palestinians, Trudeau’s reaction was a classic case of obfuscation of facts.

“Civilian life must always be protected and international and humanitarian law must always be respected. We are working closely with allies to determine exactly what happened.”

The statement deliberately avoided mentioning Israel as the murderer of children and women in Gaza.

The United States also denounced as “savage” the strike on the Ukrainian hospital, accusing Russia of deliberately carrying out the attack.  

US President Joe Biden called the attack a "horrific reminder of Russia's brutality."

On Al-Ahli hospital bombing last year, Biden went out of his way to defend and shield the perpetrator.

“I have faith in the source from which I’ve gotten it. Our Defense Department says it’s highly unlikely that it was Israelis. It would’ve had a different footprint,” he said at the time.

Newly-elected British prime minister, Keir Starmer, also condemned Ukraine hospital attack, describing “attacking innocent children” as the “most depraved of actions”.

On the other hand, the UK government has issued statements since October 7 that justify the genocide committed by Israel through the mass killing and starvation of innocent Palestinians.

In April, Starmer’s predecessor Rishi Sunak was quoted as saying that the UK is “shocked by bloodshed” in the Palestinian territory but “stands by Israel's right to defend itself.”

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Dr Muhammad Abu Salmiya, director of Gaza’s al-Shifa Hospital, and other freed prisoners have spoken of dreadful torture and abuse against Palestinians inside Israeli prisons.

Attack on Gaza hospitals and West’s silence

The Al-Nasr Children's Hospital in western Gaza City was rendered inoperative late last year due to a string of Israeli attacks. According to the Palestinian Health Ministry, scores of children died at the hospital due to oxygen deprivation.

Israeli forces stormed the al-Shifa Hospital complex twice using tanks and drones, killing hundreds of patients and other Palestinians who had sought refuge in the medical complex.

Palestinian authorities said more than 400 Palestinians died during the second Israeli military raid on Gaza’s al-Shifa Hospital in March.

At the beginning of April mass graves at the al-Shifa Hospital complex were found and 381 bodies were exhumed when Israeli forces withdrew from the medical complex.

Two children’s hospitals, al-Rantisi and al-Nasser, were a direct target of the regime’s bombardments.

A mass grave with 324 bodies was uncovered at al-Nasser Hospital in April.

Some of the victims were “older people, women and wounded, while others were found tied with their hands ... tied and stripped of their clothes,” Ravina Shamdasani, spokesperson for the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, said following the discovery of mass graves.

A chilling video report by an Emirati TV channel showed several premature babies were left to die in an intensive care unit (ICU) in one of Gaza’s hospitals after medical staff had to evacuate.

Western media that was quick to denounce the Ukraine hospital attack has brazenly legitimized dozens of massacres carried out by the Israeli regime in Gaza in the past ten months.

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After the New York Times story about Hamas

Netizens aghast over double standards

Netizens have strongly reacted to blatant double standards displayed by Western media outlets while reporting on Ukraine and Gaza.

“Starmer’s hypocrisy in condemning Russian attacks on Ukraine whilst silent on the murder of 16,000 children in Gaza, the obliteration of homes, schools, hospitals and the ongoing starvation of 2ml people, is simply breathtaking. He has no core,” wrote Howard Beckett, an activist from the UK.

“A Ukraine hospital is bombed by Russia. It’s the ABC news app's top story. Every single hospital in Gaza has been bombed. If you’re injured, you die. They’re the rules of Netanyahu’s genocide, but good luck finding stories about it on the ABC. Those Zionist lobbyists work hard,” tweeted a social media user from Australia, Michaela Newell.

Newell shared a screenshot of ABC News website, which had put the Ukraine attack as its top story.

Another X user, Guy Christensen also reacted to Western media’s biased reporting on Gaza.

“How the Western Media Manufactures Consent for the Genocide Israel is Committing: US defends Ukraine against Russian bombings of hospitals & At the same time we are helping Israel bomb every hospital in Gaza The media does everything they can to never blame Israel for anything,” he wrote.

Sharing Trudeau’s tweet, Siddharth, a pro-Palestine activist pointed to the racist coverage of the Western media viz a viz Palestine.

“Every Western leader, who has remained silent as Israel murdered 15,000 children in Gaza, has now come out of the woodwork to condemn the bombing of a children’s hospital in Ukraine. It’s almost as if they hate children being killed — as long as they’re white,” he wrote.

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The death toll in the besieged territory is now approaching 39,000, most of them children and women. More than two million people have been rendered homeless across the territory.

In the past 24 hours alone, the Israeli regime ramped up its brutal aggression on Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, killing more than 50 people.

The aggression continues as hopes fade for a US-proposed ceasefire plan, with Ismail Haniyeh, leader of the Palestinian resistance movement Hamas, saying Tel Aviv is undermining talks for a truce and prisoners release deal as the regime does not want to end the war.

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