Meanwhile, explosives strapped to a girl who appeared to be about 10-years-old detonated on Saturday, killing at least 20 people, in a country whose encounters with terrorism were also punctuated by a hashtagthis time “#BringBackOurGirls” of Nigeria. Boko Haram militants killed as many as 2,000 people, mostly civilians,in a massacre that started the weekend before the terror attack on Charlie Hedbo in downtown Paris.
Both the attacks in Nigeria and those in Paris are shocking and horrifying in their own respects, and yet one fomented an unprecedented international reaction — a popular show of force that rivaled even the reaction to 9/11 — while the response to the attacks in Nigeria paled in comparison.
Here are a few of the reasons why:
Symbolism
The terrorist attack on the satirical publication Charlie Hebdo was not just violent, but highly symbolic.
While the terrorists in Nigeria targeted innocent civilians in a strategic northern town in Nigeria and in a crowded marketplace, the gunmen who stormed the headquarters of Charlie Hebdo took aim at one of the most cherished values in France: freedom of expression.
The attack quickly sparked the hashtag and image on social media proclaiming “Je Suis Charlie,” I am Charlie. In a way that few nations would, the French people took the attack on Charlie Hebdo as an attack on the very core of their country’s constitution and values — a country where the line between politics and culture blends often seamlessly and where criticism and mockery of public officials rushes toward — not away — from controversy.
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And besides Americans have grown numb to the level of violence throughout the African continent, said J. Peter Pham, director of the Africa Center at the Atlantic Council. Boko Haram alone killed an estimated 10,000 people in 2014.
“There’s a sense that ‘That’s Africa, bad things happen. This is Paris, it’s a Western country. This shouldn’t happen,'” Pham explained. “We’re conditioned by years of reports coming out of Africa to expect this type of thing in Africa.”
Optics and a 24/7 media
People around the world watched for days as the manhunt and later tense standoff unfolded between French security forces and the terrorists. In France, around Europe and in the United States, people connected on social media and reacted in real time as they watched each development unfold on cable news or through dramatic videos posted to YouTube.
And that coverage dominated the news cycle, with little if any information popping up on TV about an ongoing massacre in northern Nigeria that would in the end claim 2,000 lives. Instead, most found out late this weekend or on Monday morning about the attack in Nigeria that started on Jan. 3.
There are not only fewer reporters and news cameras in Nigeria than in Paris, but access to the northern region of Nigeria where the attacks unfolded is dangerous and practically inaccessible.
“There aren’t visuals of Baga and what happened there,” Pham said of the town ravaged by Boko Haram’s militants. In Paris, everything is happening “in real time,” he added.
