British and American media covered last week’s horrific acid attack last week by Islamists on two British teenagers who were volunteering in Zanzibar, but failed to mention the fact that both are Jewish.
The two 18-year-olds, Kirstie Trup and Katie Gee, are both Jewish and members of the Federation for Zionist Youth, according to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency on Sunday, citing a report in the London Jewish Chronicle.
Islamist groups in Africa have targeted Jewish visitors before. In 2002, Al Qaeda destroyed an Israeli-owned resort in the coastal city of Mombasa, Kenya. (That same year, Jewish journalist Daniel Pearl was targeted and executed by Al Qaeda in Pakistan.) The media noted that the recent attack in Zanzibar occurred in the context of local Islamist attacks against Christians, but did not indicate that both of the victims were Jewish.
Breitbart News covered the acid attacks as well, basing our own report on a report in the UK Telegraph that missed the potentially crucial detail of the two victims’ own religious identity, which has now emerged.
The acid attack was not the first that the young women experienced. NBC News reported that one had earlier described being slapped on the street by a Muslim woman for singing during the month of Ramadan.