In Gaza, the oppressor is Israel, which is an ally of the United States and a favorite of the news media. In Syria and Iraq, the oppressor is Radical Islam, which is hated by the United States and by the Western news media.

The real difference is not about who is doing killing, but instead how the media is treating what's happening to the victims.

In Gaza, thousands of civilians have been massacred by Israel, using superior weapons supplied by the United States. Babies, infants, children, teenagers and women are among them. There, the killings are being called "disputed" and "alleged."

In Syria and Iraq, where the victims are refugees fleeing the brutality of ISIS, the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, which rose from the ashes of a failed American foreign policy in Iraq and in Syria. There, the killings are being called "atrocities." Not by the accusers, but by the news media directly.

The emotions of the reporters and the hysteria of the news media are contrasting remarkably between the two conflicts, with the media crying in the face of the "deafening silence" of the world to the atrocities in Iraq. These are the same journalists who insist that Israel had no choice but to kill civilians because, Israel has alleged, with very little proof, that the civilians are being used as "human shields" by Hamas and Gaza militants.

Instances where Israeli soldiers have monitored Palestinian civilians through their sniper sites and shot and killed them in cold blood have been disputed, denied and rejected as "fabricated." But equally gruesome videos of abuses by ISIS are being portrayed as "proof positive" that civilians are being massacred and something needs to be done. "Damn it. Do something! Well, not in Gaza. In Syria and Iraq," where America has a huge interest.

Americans don't care about Gaza, and if the American people don't care, the American media cares even less.

American journalism has come a long way from its independent beginnings when it challenged government actions and defended the defenseless, much like the 300 defenseless infants and children that have been killed in the Gaza War.

American journalism once was the champion of the rule of law. Many journalists sacrificed to bring injustices by madmen, crooks and criminals to light. They were fearless. Now they "fearmore."

In the old days of the Fourth Estate, the greatest sin was hypocrisy. The media thrived on exposing hypocrisy. Journalists would be embarrassed to be spoon-fed press releases from a government, or to allow that government to restrict their engagement in the battlefield, as Israel has done.

The whole concept of embedding began with the war mongering after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. I mean, Americans can accept the use of torture against prisoners by giving prisoners meaningless labels like "illegal combatants."

Imagine that; today, we just accept that there are "illegal combatants," which suggests then that there are "legal combatants."

Interesting concepts they must be teaching in today's journalism textbooks. Concepts that, when I was learning to become a journalist, seemed straight out of books like George Orwell's "1984."

Today, journalists need to be wary of committing transgressions that could result in their immediate dismissal. Things like Crimespeak, Malreporting, Thoughtcrime, and the Joycamp where people learn to work for their existence.

How you kill someone means more than whom you have killed. And the media is careful to explain differently how Israel is killing in Gaza and how ISIS is killing in Syria and Iraq.

In "1984," they reindoctrinated you. Today, they just fire you for violating the new media rules. Big-time journalists have been punished. MSNBC's Rula Jebreal. CNN's Octavia Nasr. Hearsts' Helen Thomas. And, some lesser-known journalists like Sunni Khalid, former managing news editor at WYPR-FM in Baltimore. Some are just removed from their assignments, like NBC news correspondent Ayman Mohyeldin. These are just the tip of the iceberg.

It's not that bias against journalists who criticize Israel didn't exist in the past. The first day I was hired for my first journalism job in 1976, I was told flat out by the newspaper editor, "Keep your views on your side of the typewriter."

And I have been told many times, including in 1990 when the Sun-Times became upset when I complained about the newspaper sending four American Jewish journalists to Israel to do a special section on Israel during the Palestinian Intifada, "Are you going to go Arab on us?"

Orwell wasn't around for the new terms that have since been created to deal with freethinkers, like "embedded journalists" or "extra-judicial killing" or "collective punishment" or "enhanced interrogation techniques."

Today, the boundaries for journalists have become sharper and narrower. And how you report on Israel will determine how long you will remain in mainstream American journalism.

It's one reason why the Internet and social media have become so important, although you may notice the mainstream news media cautioning "you can't always believe everything you read on social media."

Funny, guys. That's what they used to say about you.

Ray Hanania is an award-winning Palestinian American columnist managing editor of The Arab Daily News at www.TheArabDailyNews.com. Follow him on Twitter @RayHanania. To find out more about Ray Hanania and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit www.creators.com.