The brutal and senseless killing of three beautiful children and a Rabbi at a Jewish school in France has shocked many people around the world, including our media. Our television news presenters used adjectives like shocking and horrific to describe the killings and they were right to use such descriptions especially when the photographs showed what tiny, sweet innocent children were murdered.

What is hard to understand is why similar adjectives are not used to describe the equally brutal deaths of Palestinian children blown apart by Israeli Warplanes. Are these children somehow less sweet and innocent or are they considered to be lower species by our media?

Only on Al – Jazeera do we get photographs of the Palestinian children. In fact, any video or photographic coverage by western media tends to only show hysterical crowds of Palestinians reacting to the deaths, so perpetuating the idea that Palestinians are like reactive animals who have no self control.

Is it not enough for the Western media to be complicit in the theft of Palestinian lands and property? Or do they also need to treat them as uncontrollable mobs of so little worth and dignity that deaths of their children is not worthy of our sympathy and their innocent adult victims are no more than collateral damage?

To add to the indignity, most media reports of the Israeli Palestinian conflicts infer or state the conflict was caused by Palestinian aggression when on many occasions the reverse is true, as was the most recent case when the conflict began with the murder of a Palestinian leader by Israeli forces.

The violence began on Friday 9th March after Israel killed Zuhair al-Qaisi, head of the Popular Resistance Committees, prompting militant groups to start firing rockets over the border. Palestinian rockets damaged a building and injured an elderly woman.Israeli warplanes then attacked Gaza, killing 17 militants and 6 civilians and 83 people were injured.

A more balanced reporting that treats Palestinians with fairness and recognizes their suffering is not much to ask for but appears a road too far for the conformist western media.