THE MARKET IN ATROCITY

What Value a Dead Syrian Child


What is the current market value of an atrocity in Syria? The answer to this question depends of course on who committed it.
Let me illustrate the point by highlighting the [fictional] case of Leila. Leila is a pretty, precocious seven-year-old Syrian girl. She is well liked and has shown a particular aptitude for mathematics, her teacher sees a bright future for her. Leila is dancing in the playground when a bomb destroys her school killing her and all the other children in the playground.
First reports indicate that the school was destroyed in a coalition airstrike, the target being a nearby ISIS/Daesh training camp. There is much derision from the ant-war left when coalition sources say that they are investigating the incident and if there have been civilian casualties express deep regret.
Leila, whose name and background are provided by her grieving parents, becomes a cause celebre for Stop the War and the anti-war [sic] movement. A picture of Leila appears on the Stop the War website, next to a picture of Hilary Benn with the caption ‘Blood on your Hands Mr Benn.’ Leila is trending on Twitter along with denunciations of David Cameron and the ‘war mongering’ MP’s. Leila has become the poster girl of the Anti-War movement, her propaganda value immense.

However, two days later a different story emerges. Independent sources, including Syrians in the area, say that it was an Assad plane that dropped a bomb on the school. Yes, there was a coalition airstrike nearby, but this was earlier and indeed an Daesh training facility was hit and at least 10 Daesh fighters killed.
After some initial questioning of the changed facts the ‘anti-war’ movement goes silent, Leila’s value has dropped overnight. However just as her stock falls with the ‘anti-war’ crowd it rises rapidly for those who support military intervention in Syria. Supporters of intervention quick to point out that the coalition actively seeks to avoid civilian casualties unlike Assad, or Daesh. The very fact that the training facility was destroyed so close to a built up area was testimony to this. Leila’s death was a tragedy that demonstrates the need to destroy Daesh and bring an end to the civil war.
Leila’s death featured heavily on Iranian Press TV, with even a suggestion that Mossad might have been complicit in the bombing. Her death did, very briefly, feature on the Russian Channel RT immediately following the bombing, though for some reason it was dropped the following day.
Leila’s death no longer features in the news, nor on Twitter timelines, as firstly it is no longer news and the news circus has moved on, and secondly her death no longer holds any propaganda value. 


“All propaganda is lies, even when one is telling the truth.” George Orwell

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