Bias Against Israel Revealed in the Use of Active Tense for Israel, Passive Tense for Palestinians

 This is the headline from CNN:

Israel launches airstrikes after rockets fired from Gaza in day of escalation

(Unless they have since changed it)

I thought it was a simple aberration in language, but it is not. CNN uses this continuously in order to portray Israel as aggressors and Palestinians as victims. "Israel launches" is an aggressive act. "rockets fired" is passive: who fired them? Maybe they fired themselves? Maybe it was an accident.

Consider this text from the article (emphasis mine):

Israeli airstrikes have left at least 24 dead, including nine children, in Gaza, according to Palestinian health officials. The Israel Defense Forces says it killed 15 militants. 

Meanwhile, at least six were injured in the Israeli city of Ashkelon on Tuesday morning after a residential building was struck with rocket fire from Gaza and after the Al-Qassam Brigades, the militant wing of Hamas, vowed to "make Ashkelon hell."

Why do Israelis perform aistrikes and kill people, while Gazans do nothing? "Rocket fire from Gaza"? How about "Gazas missiles - several of which Gaza launched at Jerusalem and Ashkelon on the previous day, starting this exchange (not the Israeli airstrikes) - struck a building in Ashkelon and injured six Israelis (and killed two others)".

Watch the ridiculous video embedded in the article. Palestinians enjoying meals in Ramadan interrupted by Israeli extremist violence, when in fact the Palestinians have been rioting and violent for days. Where are those videos? The proximate cause is a dispute over some houses in a sensitive area; I'm not going to argue who is right or wrong in this case, because I still don't understand the legality of either side's argument. But that doesn't stop people from fear-mongering using racist terms, and yes, that includes the Arabs who claim, over and over, that the Jews are coming to storm and Judaize the temple mount and everyone must rise up in resistance immediately. This clarion call never gets old, never gets questioned, and the violence that results from it never gets mentioned by the foreign media, only the reaction to it.

And listen to the terms used by the journalist:

- About Arabs: "A car is torched." By whom? An accident?

- About Jews: "A blast of pepper spray and a volley of plastic chairs" Active and violent.

- About Palestinians: "Bottles, rocks, and other objects are thrown by other protesters, ..." "Are thrown by protesters"? All passive and innocent.

- Then about Jews: "Police use gun grenades". Why not "gun grenades are used to disperse the protesters"? Why "Police use gun grenades"? Because it is active and violent.

CNN, an example of bias in new coverage.

Interestingly, BBC News, which is usually equally biased, covered it with much less bias.