When Israel re-arrested Palestinian men in the occupied West Bank town of Dura, the detainees faced familiar treatment.
They were blindfolded, handcuffed, insulted and kept in inhumane conditions. More unusual was that each man had a number written on his forehead.
Osama Shaheen, who was released in August after 10 months of administrative detention, told Middle East Eye that soldiers brutally stormed his house, smashing his furniture.
“The soldiers turned us from names into numbers, and every detainee had a number that they used to provoke him during his arrest and call him by number instead of name. To them, we are just numbers.”
I wonder why this seems to be the only news org posting this. It seems we know there are camps in the West Bank where people are being detained, and we know the conditions are brutal, but the numbers on the forehead is a very specific extra detail that I can’t seem to find any other sources on numbers being written on foreheads. Did MEE just get the exclusive scoop or what?
Well if all you are used to is your establishment talking heads in narrow lockstep then it might be off putting. It isn’t at all damning for a single outlet to report on something. Especially when working somewhere so dangerous to be.
In reality this is, as others seem to be at pains to point out, a minor addition to the mountian of nightsoil. It wouldn’t make a lot of sense to fabricate such a lightweight appendix if it is likely to undermine reporting on more serious events.
Calling it branding isn’t entirely out of scope with the normal usage of the word either. It just is slightly problematic in that we are now conditioned to expect the very worst of humanity from some of the IDF soldiers so our minds expect hot irons.
Yeah that’s what trips me up: it seems like such a “lightweight appendix” (good expression) to tag onto what we already know. I guess some stories just break with one reporter and one lead.