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A general problem with Western reportage is that inordinate attention is paid to Israeli victims when compared to Palestinian victims. It is common to find the names of Israeli victims, and some of the harrowing details of the tragedy afflicting such persons. However, the reportage of Palestinian victims is very different; in general, they are usually not named, the circumstances of their death are not described, and wounded Palestinians are seldom mentioned! It seems that MacIntyre replicates this emphasis bias in this article initiating his article referring to a single Israeli victim, and relegating the Palestinian victims to a second plane. Well, at least MacIntyre didn't provide the name of the Israeli victim, but still in his appreciation one Israeli victim is more newsworthy compared to the genocidal Israeli actions conducted in Gaza. -- Paul de Rooij

Paul de Rooij is a Dutch mathematician and economist. He lives in London.

He has been a committed activist on Palestine since the first intifada. Among others, he has written for Z Magazine, Agenda (Ann Arbor), CounterPunch, Arab Media Internet Network, Miftah and some Media Research journals. His interests include: effectiveness of propaganda and the formation of ideology, language and discourse, contemporary Palestinian history, modern European history, Latin American history, globalization and development, and ecology. His favourite writers on Palestinian/ME issues include Edward Said, Noam Chomsky, Robert Fisk, Edward Herman, Azmi Bishara, Uri Avnery, Amira Hass and Michael Palumbo. Politically, he belongs to the generic left; he says that, basically, he "is driven by issues of justice and peace (in that order)".
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Independent.co.uk

Infant is killed in Israeli attack

By Donald Macintyre in Jerusalem
Thursday, 28 February 2008

A baby was killed in an air raid on Hamas government buildings in Gaza last night when the Israeli military retaliated for a lethal rocket attack launched by the Palestinian militant group.

A 47-year-old student was killed outside his college in the Israeli border town of Sderot during a heavy barrage of missiles launched by Hamas after five of its militants died in an earlier Israeli strike on Gaza. He was in a parked car when one of at least 30 rockets fired at Sderot, Ashkelon and nearby communities struck his vehicle, inflicting lethal wounds to his chest.

The death – the first in an rocket attack on Israel from Gaza since May last year – came on a day of violence in which at least 12 Palestinians were killed in Gaza and the West Bank. The five militants, described by Hamas leasders as "five of our best fighters", were killed when a van in which they were travelling was attacked from the air in southern Gaza.

After nightfall, a third Israeli strike, aimed at a rocket squad, killed two children as they left a mosque, Palestinian sources said. The Israeli military said it carried out the airstrike but had noknowledge of civilians being hit.