How TikTok is informing young people about the Palestinian Casualties of the War
The Israeli-led conflict in Gaza has led to a significant increase in child amputees, with around 1,000 children losing one or both their legs. This number has risen significantly due to Israel’s ongoing onslaught through densely populated areas. The UN has announced it will add Israel to a blacklist of countries and organizations harming children in conflict zones, which is about seven months overdue. One of the challenges of telling the truth about the effects of Israel’s war on Gaza’s civilian population has been the refusal by Israeli authorities to allow access to foreign journalists into Gaza.
Channel 4 in the UK has been committed to centring Palestinian perspectives in its coverage, despite the challenges at hand. “Kill Zone: Inside Gaza” by C4’s Dispatches is one of the most disturbing films, highlighting the reality for Palestinians that there are no safe places in Gaza today. The film highlights the power of this disinformation in providing the necessary window-dressing for media corporations and politicians to continue to justify this assault.
The generational shift happening around attitudes to Palestine has deepened as social media has taken over the delivery of information to younger audiences. The dissonance between the images they are seeing from original sources, or from people they might otherwise know or trust on social media, has deepened an already growing generational chasm on attitudes to Palestine. This is rooted in the disinformation mainstream news platforms have allowed Israeli officials to continue to spread, in the face of mounting war crimes.
Israel has killed over 8,200 Palestinian children in Gaza, the most dangerous place in the world for children.
Steve Sosebee, from the Palestine Children’s Relief Fund, shares the stories of two Palestinians who received medical care in the U.S. for free via medical care by PCRF in Gaza.
The two young men were shot by Israeli snipers during the Great March of Return protests in 2018 and were killed alongside their families by Israeli airstrikes on and after Christmas Day.
The state of medical care in Gaza is dire, with patients forced to undergo amputations without anesthesia and forgo life-saving medications amid Israel’s ongoing blockade.
The time is now for Palestinians to be depicted with the dignity they deserve – in their voice, with their aspirations, including for the success of the national liberation movement. While liberal media has often confused pitying depictions of Palestinian victims as balanced coverage, it is no such thing – it is a guilty penance for the reality of the horrors they know are unfolding but which they do not cover accurately.
True editorial justice on this story involves allowing the Palestinian liberation movement to be heard on it’s own terms.
This is no longer about pitying wounded children – it is about holding Israel truly accountable for its crimes and giving voice to an occupied people’s call for freedom. Palestinians deserve justice and those watching their struggle through screens around the world are increasingly aware and on board.
It’s about time the mainstream media caught up, or else they risk losing their remaining credibility to the TikTok brigade.
