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| Edited By: Palki Sharma Upadhyay |Source: DNA |Updated: Mar 30, 2017, 08:05 AM IST
This is the story of two children. Both five years old. Both caught in the crossfire as foreign forces rained bombs on their homes to flush out the Islamic State. Omran Daqneesh was pulled out of the rubble in Aleppo in August last year, bruised and bleeding. His images caused international outrage. Western media called the perpetrators “war criminals”.
Seven months later Hawraa survived an airstrike in West Mosul’s Jadeda. Still swinging between life and death, she is the only survivor in her neighbourhood. She does not know that her mother has been killed. She has not made headlines in the Western press. No outrage. Why is one child a victim of a war crime while the other “collateral damage”? Because the first strike involved Russian forces and the second the US-led coalition forces. One is “inhumane”, the other is acting for “greater good”.
Mosul isn’t Aleppo, counter journalists reporting on the ground. “Russian forces deliberately targeted civilians, the West tries to minimise civilian casualties,” goes their refrain. Consider this case. Forty-six civilians were killed in air raids on a mosque complex in al Jinah near Aleppo on March 17. Coalition forces say they were targeting an al Qaeda meeting nearby. “Nearby” in this case means 50 metres. So the mosque was not the target but they knew it was there, a stone’s throw away, well within the margin of error. What is worse - admitting that you are targeting civilian areas because you know they have terrorists or insisting your killings are not deliberate?
Mosul, according to those who have reported from there, is like Chandni Chowk multiplied by five. Congested, packed with people, with virtually no room for military vehicles to manoeuvre. ISIS has turned it into a booby trap. Civilians are being used as human shields. Whoever thought “surgical strikes” with minimum civilian casualties was a possibility, was delusional. Yet repeated offensives were launched. So much for inadvertent killings. Experts say the only way to fight this is by employing guerrilla tactics. Even then there would be civilian casualties, though much lower. What would go up is the casualty figure of the coalition forces, mostly the Iraqi army. So they drop bombs to “liberate” Mosul and end up killing hundreds of civilians, including women and children. Inadvertently, of course.
The Pentagon has launched an investigation into the March 17 strike. The same government is the perpetrator and the investigator. While the world media was busy showing solidarity with London on the Westminster attacks, the Royal Air Force sent jets with the Americans to bomb Mosul. Coalition forces put the civilian death toll in Syria and Iraq since 2014 at 220. Independent human rights groups say it is as high as 3,000. The difference is staggering. We ask the journalists. Only those embedded with the security forces get the soundbites, the access and most dramatic visuals. They depend on the forces for their story and their safety in a war zone. Even the staunchest upholders of “truth” must do a fine balancing act, given the circumstances. One cannot help but be circumspect about who is controlling the narrative.
And so it is that Omran gets sympathy and support while Hawraa is relegated to the collateral register.
The author is Deputy Editor, WION.
