The limited coverage given to the apparent terrorist attack in the Belgian city of Liege was notable. Two female police officers were stabbed to death by a 29 year old named Benjamin Herman who then used their weapons to shoot a civilian sitting in a car. There were reports the killer, a petty criminal who had spent much of his life in jail and only been released two days before, had shouted “Allahu Akbar” as he committed his murders.

He was shot dead by police after he had taken a hostage at a nearby school.

It is not so long ago that this latest seeming terror attack would have merited headlines worldwide. But the media were notably restrained in their initial coverage. It was reported Herman had been “radicalized” in prison, but then it emerged he was suspected of another murder the day before. The Belgian authorities began to warn this was not necessarily a terror attack. The advice served to validate the caution with which press and broadcasters had originally approached the story.

This responsible attitude has to be welcomed on two grounds. The first is that any crime committed in Europe by the killers of Daesh (the self-proclaimed IS) impacts on the continent’s law-abiding and peaceful Muslim communities. Daesh is effectively in league with racist politicians throughout Europe who are pursuing Islamophobic goals. Each terrorist enormity is used to stir up suspicion and to foster fear and even hatred of all Muslims in Europe. Meanwhile, the terrorists hope that both verbal and physical attacks on Muslim communities will bring new recruits to their evil black banner, duped by the message that only the terrorists can protect them.

The second reason for welcoming the measured media response to the Liege outrage is that if it was indeed a terror attack, the terrorists should not be given the oxygen of publicity. Of course terror crimes should not be hidden from the public - as was shown here in the Kingdom - encouraging public vigilance and reporting of suspicious behavior can contribute substantially to the unmasking of terror cells. But when attacks are reported, they should not be sensationalized and given massive coverage.

It was entirely a different matter this week when blanket reporting was given to the extraordinary bravery of an asylum seeker from Mali who climbed four stories up the outside of a block of flat in Paris to rescue a four-year-old boy dangling from a balcony. Mamoudou Gassama, who was among the hundreds of thousands of migrants who make their way across the Libyan Sahara and then the perils of the Mediterranean, had arrived illegally in France last year.

Under France’s increasingly strict asylum rules, it was perfectly possible Mamoudou Gassama, a Muslim, would have been sent home. Instead in recognition of his courageous act, which was filmed by a passerby, he was whisked off to see President Emmanuel Macron himself who immediately granted him French citizenship, gave him a bravery award and promised to arrange the job he wanted as a fireman. Now that is the sort of news the world ought to hear about, a story to being joy to the hearts of everyone except Islamophobic National Front politicians and Daesh terrorists who dream of alienating French Muslims from the country in which they are proud to live.