Night was coming on as I arrived in Heathrow airport on Tuesday. In a waiting lounge at the airport’s central bus station, the urgent and meretricious tones of the television news could be heard. A gang of homicidal thugs had massacred 41 innocent people and injured 239 at Turkey’s Ataturk airport.

But then, right there, the media fanfare stopped. Unlike the recent attack in Orlando, or the terrorist assault on the streets of Paris last November, terrorism in Turkey isn’t deemed worthy of a week-long investigation.

British Prime Minister David Cameron hoisted the Belgian flag above Downing Street following the Brussels attacks earlier this year, but we won’t see the same treatment for Turkey. So far, solidarity is yet to exceed hackneyed diplo-speak and statements of the obvious; Cameron described the attack as “hideous”, as if anyone needed telling.

Why do we feel content with such a tepid reaction? After all, we would be expecting much more from our political leaders if it were in Europe or the US.

Video shows moment Istanbul airport bomber brought down by police

So why is it that when an attack like Brussels or Orlando happens, the world is forced to mourn (quite rightly) and the West becomes the centre of the world’s gravity yet when the producers of indiscriminate explosions strike in Beirut, Baghdad or Istanbul, it merits fleeting news coverage at best?

Why will Jerusalem’s Old City Wall’s not be illuminated red with the Turkish flag? Why will there not be a barrage of celebrity tweets and tear-jerking speeches about the massacre in Ankara?

Attack at Ataturk International airport in Istanbul Show all 20 1 /20 Attack at Ataturk International airport in Istanbul Attack at Ataturk International airport in Istanbul A mother of victims reacts outside a forensic medicine building close to Istanbul's airport AFP/Getty Images Attack at Ataturk International airport in Istanbul Broken windows are pictured at the attacks and explosions site in Ataturk airport's international arrivals terminal AFP/Getty Images Attack at Ataturk International airport in Istanbul Bullet impacts are pictured at Ataturk airport AFP/Getty Images Attack at Ataturk International airport in Istanbul Police officers patrol at Istanbul Ataturk airport Reuters Attack at Ataturk International airport in Istanbul Workers clean the debris from the blasts at Istanbul Ataturk airport Getty Images Attack at Ataturk International airport in Istanbul A wounded girl from the Ataturk Airport suicide bomb attack is transported to the Bakirkoy Sadi Konuk Hospital Getty Images Attack at Ataturk International airport in Istanbul Passengers embrace outside Ataturk airport`s main entrance in Istanbul AFP/Getty Images Attack at Ataturk International airport in Istanbul Medics carry wounded people to a hospital after a suicide bomb attack at Ataturk Airport in Istanbul EPA Attack at Ataturk International airport in Istanbul Relatives of the Ataturk Airport suicide bomb attack victims wait outside Bakirkoy Sadi Konuk Hospital Getty Images Attack at Ataturk International airport in Istanbul A Saudi tourist who survived the Ataturk Airport suicide bomb attack waits for his wounded mother outside the Bakirkoy Sadi Konuk Hospital Getty Images Attack at Ataturk International airport in Istanbul A Turkish riot police officer patrols Ataturk airport`s main entrance in Istanbul Ozane Kose/AFP/Getty Images Attack at Ataturk International airport in Istanbul Passengers wait at Ataturk airport`s main enterance in Istanbu, after two explosions followed by gunfire hit Turkey's largest airport Ozan Kose/AFP/Getty Images Attack at Ataturk International airport in Istanbul Forensic police work the explosion site at Ataturk airport Ozane Kose/AFP/Getty Images Attack at Ataturk International airport in Istanbul Passengers leave Istanbul Ataturk, after a suicide bomb attack Getty Attack at Ataturk International airport in Istanbul Armed security man escorts people from a car park at Istanbul Ataturk airport REUTERS Attack at Ataturk International airport in Istanbul Armed security walks at Istanbul Ataturk airport Murad Sezer/REUTERS Attack at Ataturk International airport in Istanbul Ambulance cars arrive at Istanbul Ataturk airport Osman Orsal/REUTERS Attack at Ataturk International airport in Istanbul An ambulance arrives at the Ataturk airport REUTERS Attack at Ataturk International airport in Istanbul The weapons used in the attack REUTERS Attack at Ataturk International airport in Istanbul Passengers leave Istanbul Ataturk, after a suicide bomb attack Getty

The tutors of our moral indignation, the think-piece merchants and media pundits, have managed to outmanoeuvre our better judgement by inculcating a simple but politicised cognitive bias: we (Westerners) are killed in terrorist attacks, and it’s a tragedy; they (Arabs, Turks) die in terrorist attacks, and it’s an unfortunate norm in a destabilized region.

In total, 41 people have been killed and 239 left injured after the attacks at Ataturk. And according to Iraq Body Count, 1,087 Iraqis were killed by suicide bombings in June alone. And no one flinches.

It is a casual assumption, informed by lazy generalisations about the Arab or Muslim world – including Turkey – that violence is and will always be, an intrinsic part of life in the Middle East.

This is not to try and discourage such acts of solidarity, as they are important mechanisms for defeating fascism, it is to question why the same demonstrations of grievance are not afforded to our Turkish and Arab brothers and sisters.

But the persistence of tribal thinking about identity, and the indifference it produces in our news coverage and politics – even in the face of great misery caused by the current wave of Islamist terrorism – is a grim symptom of our political underdevelopment.