Nothing could demonstrate the double standards of the Western political class and their media echo chambers better than the bombardment of the densely populated area of western Mosul, which they have virtually ignored, former MP George Galloway, told RT.
Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi said the anti-ISIS operation in the city of Mosul has entered its final stage. He also warned the number of refugees would increase.
READ MORE: #MosulSOS: RT penetrates fog of war around civilians’ plight in besieged Mosul
More than 200,000 people have been displaced by the fighting in Mosul since the anti-terror operation started in October, according to the International Organization for Migration (IOM).
Hala Jaber, the spokesperson for the International Organization for Migration in Iraq, said that “There are huge numbers of civilians being displaced on a daily basis. The numbers as of yesterday - and those numbers only reflect IDPs that have gone into camps - total 13,428 families, which amounts about 80,568 individuals… The exodus of the displaced is increasing on a daily basis.”
Although none of this is being heard in the mainstream media, civilians who managed to escape from the city warn they fear the bombs of their supposed 'liberators' as much as those of the Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL) terrorists.
RT: Why do you think there's been such a difference in the mainstream media's coverage of the battles in Aleppo and in Mosul?
George Galloway: Nothing could more vividly demonstrate the sickening hypocrisy and double standards of the Western political class and their media echo chambers, whether state broadcasters or the so-called private sector news media all of whom have virtually completely ignored the massive bombardment of the densely populated civilian area in western Mosul, while in paroxysms of fake grief about the situation in east Aleppo. As it happens, I know both of these cities very well. And they are entirely comparable except that Mosul is very much bigger and western Mosul very much more densely populated. Yet, day after day hundreds of people are being slaughtered in the indiscriminate bombardment, which doesn’t target ISIS but instead actually acts as a recruiting agent for whatever comes after ISIS. This savage bombing of the Iraqi people in Mosul by Western aircraft are extremizing not just Sunni Muslims in Iraq, but across the region and indeed across the world.
Now, the Russian Air Force and the Syrian Army were fighting exactly the same adversaries in Aleppo as the Americans, and the Iraqi governments are fighting in Mosul. But, Aleppo was treated as a monstrous war crime, and Mosul was first of all treated as a boy’s adventure war story before it disappeared from the media entirely. It really is sickening…Do you recall the sea of hashtags and ‘I stand with Aleppo’ and all that? And there is nothing comparable about Mosul. They are just hypocrites, double-standard hypocrites: the political class, their media echo chamber and the so-called liberals that follow them both.
Certainly, the mainstream media has covered Aleppo and Mosul very differently. And that is largely because the Mosul operation was a US-backed operation against ISIS. And the Aleppo operation involves the Syrian Army and Syrian government, backed up by the Russians. So, where that one is being portrayed as a series of atrocities and the killing of civilians, the Mosul situation, the killing of civilians is being deemphasized. I’m not surprised that there is less criticism as to what is happening in Mosul given the US media. - Peter Kuznik, Professor of History and Director of the Nuclear Studies Institute at American University, Co-author The Untold History of the United States.
RT: Several news outlets have focused on the recent UN report which blames Assad's troops and their allies for deliberate air strikes on the humanitarian infrastructure in Syria. Do you expect the same kind of UN and media attention to the bombings in Mosul?
GG: Of course not, because the truth is the Western governments and politicians have been secretly assisting ISIS either directly or indirectly, in some cases absolutely brazenly the Western satrapies in the Persian Gulf, Saudi Arabia and so on openly and directly, the others covertly or indirectly by giving things to one group of people when they knew that those people could not hold on to what they were given for five minutes and it would be taken off them by ISIS and Al-Qaeda. The secret conspiracy of the West behind Al-Qaeda and ISIS in the land of sham will be a gigantic shame on Western governments throughout all history to come.
The statements, views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of RT.