Is this newsworthy? Gaza hospital workers are on strike, emergency declared

Gaza hospital cleaners have gone on strike this morning for at least the third time since September because they haven't been paid since the "unity"  government was announced.

They struck for three days in September and three more days in November, and today started a new strike that is open-ended

The Gaza health ministry declared an emergency, because without these hospital workers they cannot schedule surgeries. It also affects the care of hundreds of people on dialysis, intensive care and pediatrics wards.

Even though this is a legitimate health crisis, the hundreds of reporters in and around Gaza are simply not interested in writing any articles about this for Western audiences.

During wartime, the news media are filled with human interest stories of ordinary Gazans facing trials and troubles. Injured patients are interviewed multiple times. Statistics are published and Gaza remains the top story for weeks.

But when Gaza hospital patients are in clear danger - a danger that can be solved with the help of a little publicity to urge funding for hospital workers instead of, say, the families of terrorists - the story is simply not covered by the huge press corps.

The bias is clear. A health crisis in Gaza is only important if there is a way to blame Jews. Otherwise, editors and reporters and management of news media outlets really don[t give a damn about the lives of Gazans.

In retrospect, this story proves that the tearjerker articles of the summer were not meant to get news consumers to care about Gazans. If the media cared about Gazans, this would be a story.

No, the stories of the summer were meant to get the world to hate Israel.

And no amount of justifications from news editors about their coverage can erase the simple fact that human interest stories of Palestinians are only important if somehow there is an Israeli angle. Corruption, infighting, incitement, and stories like these aren't interesting to the media if they cannot blame Israel.

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