Out of the picture
In the Aug. 21 issue, New Jersey Jewish News ran a JTA piece under the headline “Bucking the UN: Alleging bias, Israel again keeping distance from Gaza probe,” which was illustrated by a photo of a little Palestinian Arab girl standing amid rubble in Gaza.
On Aug. 22, Daniel Tragerman, a four-year-old Jewish child, was killed by a mortar shell fired from the Gaza Strip that landed outside their home in Kibbutz Nahal Oz. I waited to see how his death would be covered in this week’s newspaper and was very disappointed to note that there was no mention at all of his death: not how he died, how he lived and was loved, nor the picture of the sweet, young boy that other newspapers had included along with their stories. The JTA photo of the little girl in Gaza, not unlike other photos we have seen in secular papers in the United States and around the world, is an attempt to conjure up pity for the children and their situation.
While sad, she is alive. Daniel is not. I would have hoped that the New Jersey Jewish News would have found a way to memorialize the life of this child and, in so doing, express sorrow for the anxiety and fright countless Jewish children experienced with missiles being fired and red alerts sounding day and night.
Ferne Hassan
Millburn
comments