Photographs and Citizens

In light of today's terror attacks in Jerusalem, a few thoughts have been occupying some of my headspace and I decided to share them here.

1. Photographs of the dead:
I was involved in a debate today regarding whether or not it was appropriate to share scene-of-the-crime photographs of those murdered in the attack in order to raise awareness of the "realness" of the issue and open the eyes of the people who read headlines that make the aggressors sound like victims. I believe that to do this is very much not ok and is extremely disrespectful to the victims and their families to use the photos as such a prop. An argument I heard was that the "other side" uses this tactic very successfully and maybe it's about time we show some pictures too and garner sympathy to our plight. Excuse me if I'm wrong but to me that's like saying "Hey, that guy who robbed a bank was never caught and stole a million dollars, therefore a good way to make a million dollars is to rob a bank". It's wrong, and the victims deserve better.

2. Citizenship status of the terrorists:
I'm not exactly sure what is to be gained by pointing out that the terrorist today were full blown citizens of Israel. It's not news to me that there are Arabs who are citizens of this country, and that they have every right afforded to the Jewish citizens. Knowing that the terrorists today were citizens doesn't make me more worried about a terror attack because these ones are living among us. To me, that's old news and if I'm more vigilant tomorrow than I am today, it's because an attack happened, not because it happened at the hands of an Arab citizen.