Afrasianet - In October 2024, Lebanese writer Lina Munther wrote, "Ask any Arab what has been most painful over the past year, and they will tell you: we have discovered how dehumanized we are to the extent that it is impossible to continue living as we were before." These words have deeply affected followers of the Palestinian and Arab cause, reflecting a growing sense of exclusion and marginalization at the Western media and political level.

In an article published on her platform, American author Kathleen Johnson said that this sense of isolation and exclusion was not just a personal feeling, but was reflected on the ground through daily practices that reveal the double standards of the West. It points to repeated Israeli raids on Lebanon, carried out even during a supposed "ceasefire," as an example of ignoring the lives of Arab civilians, as opposed to the Western media's focus on the lives of Israelis or Westerners if they are threatened.

Johnson also noted that the same media terminology reveals this bias: Israelis held by Hamas are described as "hostages," while innocent Palestinians held by Israel are described as "prisoners," as if an Arab's life is less valuable.

These daily abuses in Palestine and Lebanon, from mass killings to restriction of movement, are taking place with little impact in the Western media, with less significant events in the news if their victims are Westerners. This detachment from Arab human reality, according to Johnson, reflects a deep malaisement in Western societies, where the value of life seems to be more tied to religious or national affiliation than to purely human.

In her article, Johnson continued that the Western media and politicians reverently commemorate the attacks on the West, while ignoring the genocide to which the Palestinians are exposed, stressing that this detachment from the Arab humanitarian reality reflects a deep sickness in Western societies. She pointed out that the Western right-wing political discourse justifies the killing of Muslims as a virtue, which makes it illogical to defend the West if this is the moral status of Western civilization itself.

The past years have revealed that the West needs not only protection, but also a reassessment of its essence and the preservation of its soul, stressing that the difference between caring about the lives of Westerners and Arabs demonstrates a deep moral crisis in Western civilization.