Eritrean Protests and the "No Jews, No News" Principle

They’re holding signs up about being refugees and about Eritrea’s regime. Not Israel. So why does the media paint a different picture?

In a global media landscape, coverage should reflect the significance and implications of a particular event. The recent protests by Eritreans in Tel Aviv is another example of how obsession with Jews reduces parity of coverage. Instead of focusing on the plight of refugees who escaped ‘The North Korea of Africa’, or the Tigrayan, Ethiopian and Eritrean conflict, people are yet again stuck in their obsession over the Jewish state. This obsession hides a bigger picture, including why Africans are desperate to seek asylum.

For those unaware, recent Eritrean protests got violent due to division between Regime Supporters and Anti-Regime Protesters. The anti-regime protesters refuse to recognize Eritrea’s regime. They want the world to acknowledge the human rights violations happening in Africa.

Note: I don’t have any clue why there is a single regime supporter living outside of Eritrea, as an asylum seeker, nor will I get to hear that bizarre take.

CNN spent a total of one line in an inflammatory article to talk about why the protests were happening, “Videos on social media showed Eritrean government supporters clashing with anti-government protesters.” The Guardian did not do any better, simply saying, “Clashes began on Saturday outside a venue in south Tel Aviv that was to host an event organised by the Eritrean embassy in Israel.” The rest of their articles were focused on the J̶e̶w̶i̶s̶h̶ Israeli response.

Al Jazeera, aka Qatari Propaganda News Network, long time hater of Jews and Israel, did better by directly mentioning the human rights abuses that spurred these protests. They showed some bias writing, “Footage on social media showed Eritrean government supporters beating anti-government protesters with clubs. Reuters journalists saw men with head wounds and bloodied arms, some lying on the ground of a children’s playground.”

Anyone who watches the videos of the protests would describe it as an all out brawl, not one way violence. Rports of hospitalized regime supporters show they took a harsher beating than AJ let off. I’m tempted to look past this anti-regime bias because I share it. Then again, Al Jazeera’s TV reports on the clashes did not dive into why the protests were happening. So I can continue to say that AJ is pure garbage in English, and even worse in Arabic.

Other papers, including AP, tried to explain the protests, writing, “The clashes came as Eritrean government supporters marked the 30th anniversary of the current ruler’s rise to power. The event was held near the Eritrean embassy in south Tel Aviv. Eritrea has one of the world’s worst human rights records. Asylum seekers in Israel and elsewhere say they fear death if they were to return.”

Don’t get excited to defend AP. As a reminder, the Associated Press (AP) has more than 40 staffers in Israel, meaning more reporters dedicated to obsessing over Israel than AP has in vast regions like China, Russia, India, or even the combined 50 countries of sub-Saharan Africa.

Protests about what?!

Here’s the kicker: Similar violence happened at Eritrean protests in Sweden, Canada and other countries. They simply were underreported. As WashingtonPost wrote in their article about the Israeli police reaction to violence, “In Canada last month, at least two state-sponsored Eritrean festivals were canceled in Toronto and Edmonton after violence broke out among protesters and government supporters. In Stockholm, over 50 people were injured in a brawl outside a similar event.”

Amongst the aforementioned media names—Washington Post, AP, AJ, CNN — I could not find ONE article on these protests. Sure, 100+ injured is more than 50+. But Washington Post, who spent a total of one sentence on the Swedish Eritrean protests, has two articles on the Israeli protests. They acknowledge that there were protests elsewhere, but silently defend that they are not worth writing about.

Note: Some of these media giants also downplayed the number of Eritrean migrants at 17K, rather than the actual 30K+ number. It’s the “death by 1000 paper cuts” that Jews know too well.

There are no arguments as to why police response to violent protests in Israel is more important than police response to violent protests in Sweden or Canada, or anywhere else. So why do we only have stories on the former? Numbers reveal that Israel was dealing with more violent protesters.

We are failing to listen to protesters’ concerns. The dichotomy of regime supporters and anti-regime protesters is being ignored for jokes about their shirt colors. Now that Bibi has threatened to deport those accused of violence, there is sure to be more articles about Israel’s reactions, while no signaling of more attention to the actual issue: Eritreans are at risk under their current regime.

Why does a nation as small as Israel command such outsized attention? The answer for this bias is simple to those who admit Israel represents the Jewish people. It gets complex for those who refuse to admit the obvious. Balanced reporting is a joke so long as the “No Jews, No News” maxim lives.

The world deserves a fuller, more comprehensive picture, devoid of regional biases. Arab, African, Asian, Latin American and other refugees are hurt most by this obsession with blaming Jews, rather than blaming the people the protesters are actually pointing fingers at.

This picture says, “Asylum seekers are willing to get hurt to show why they fled Eritrea. Listen to them!” Sadly, the media will use it to paint a racist picture, one way or another.