Reuters Graphic: Palestinians, Israelis Die in “Street Violence”
Following last week’s photo caption which whitewashed Palestinian attacks against Israelis as “Palestinians confronting Israelis,” Reuters’ graphics department has come up with new terminology for Palestinian stabbings, shootings and ramming attacks against Israeli civilians and security forces: “street violence.”
The text at the top left of the graphic reads:
At least fifty-five Palestinians and nine Israelis have died in recent street violence, which was in part triggered by Palestinians’ anger over what they see as Jewish encroachment on Jerusalem’s Al-Aqsa Mosque compound.
In fact, some 30 Palestinians were killed as they carried out, or attempted to carry out, stabbing, shooting and ramming attacks against Israelis. The rest were killed as they engaged in violent clashes with Israeli security forces. The nine Israelis were killed in Palestinian stabbing, ramming and shooting attacks.
The “street violence” euphemism does nothing to explain the nature of the “Incidents since Oct. 1” (both “incidents with fatalities” and “Ooher incidents”) mapped out in the large map in the graphic’s right side. The graphic does commendably detail the most recent attacks — “A Palestinian man was shot dead after he tried to stab a security guard,” “A Palestinian man was shot dead after he stabbed and wounded an Israeli soldier,” and “A Palestinian woman was shot dead by Israeli police when she drew a knife after being asked to identify herself” — but what are readers supposed to make of the other “incidents” dotting the map in places like Raanana, Petah Tikva, Tel Aviv, Afula, Kiryat Gat, Beersheba, and more? That Israeli and Palestinian gangs of errant teenagers were duking it out in “street violence”?
This distorted terminology earns Reuters yet another entry in the popular collection of abominable and absurd journalistic characterizations of Palestinian violence, “Wave of Palestinian Violence Accompanied By Spate of Bad Writing.”
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