The world has plunged into a heated debate over Israel-Palestine following Hamas’ attack last month and Israel’s subsequent attacks on Gaza.
Hamas attack exclusively condemned by Muslim clerics in Britain, but they also expressed “excessive force” by Israel on the unarmed civilians in Gaza, particularly the attack on a hospital and convoy of aid trucks at Rafah crossing from Egypt for the besieged Gaza Strip is an inhumane act and highly inexcusable.
The 75-year-old unsettled dispute has created visible division across the globe. On one hand, most Western government heads visited Tel Aviv in a bid to stand with Israel. Their masses, tens of thousands, are in the streets protesting the government’s stance.
The largest Jewish diaspora in New York is split up by the current war on Gaza. Many Jewish activists have started the ‘Not in our name’ campaign, sending a strong message to the Israeli government that they are against the persecution of innocent civilians in Gaza on the pretext of a few bad guys.
This analysis presents the media reporting on an all-time sensitive, controversial and difficult-to-report issue, namely the Israel and Palestine dispute. Since the beginning of the current conflict between Israel and Palestine that brought unhealed suffering to innocent civilians, the media has been accused of taking sides rather than presenting unbiased accounts of the conflict.
I have collected, watched, read and listened to over 250 items over the last two weeks since Oct. 7, 2023, including opinion pieces, articles, features, news bulletins, talk shows, TikTokers and YouTube podcasts.
Moreover, to maintain a balance between news coverage of the current event, I incorporated both liberal and conservative views; for instance, The Guardian, The Daily Telegraph, The Washington Post, The New York Post, Times of India, the Jerusalem Post and Haaretz and broadcasters including Channel 4, Sky News, CBS News, Fox News, CNN, MSNBC, Reuters, Democracy Now, France 24, DW, WION and Aljazeera.
Relatedly, I have also watched YouTubers and TikTok posts carrying interviews of prominent Youtubers, politicians, government officials and campaigners, for example, Piers Morgan, Amy Goodman and Major Gaurav Arya shows.
The thematic analysis approach assisted in detecting four major themes in the aggregate reporting of print and broadcast media, namely, privilege, people and public sentiment.
The aggregate reporting on the Israel-Palestine conflict shows a disproportionate presence of independent and liberal voices, as most guests invited to TV shows were either given limited time or systematically pushed to apologize for their views other than favoring the Israeli government rhetoric.
A considerable number of European government heads and officials, media pundits, politicians and public figures stress that Israel has a right to defend its territory while denying the same right to the Palestinians.
Notably, U.S. Secretary Antony Blinken said: “Israel has the right-indeed, the obligation to defend itself and to ensure that this never happens again.”
Evidently, most media outlets follow official rhetoric as their government heads rush to Tel Aviv to show their support for Israel, even though the visible majority of their public disagrees with their state policy. The mainstream media refrained itself from showing the British public denouncing Rishi Sunak as an “un-elected Prime Minister” who does not have the public support to decide on the issue.
On this issue, BBC, CNN, Sky News, Fox News and numerous other television channels anchors invited selected guests and if a few liberal voices appeared, they were forced to embrace official rhetoric and agree with these anchor’s views.
For example, Sky News anchor Erin Molan forced her guest, Dr. Randa Abdel-Fattah, to believe that Hamas has “beheaded babies” and that she should accept it as a “terrorist organization.”
Notably, most media organizations avoid taking soundbites from prominent pro-Palestinian European politicians, Orthodox Jews, liberal Jewish scholars and journalists, and Muslim and Christian campaigners, including John Pilger, Miko Peled, Norman Finkelstein, Matt Carthy, Mary Lou McDonald and Brendan Howlins, are absent from TV screens like GB News where pro-Israeli supporters like Nigel Farage gets privileged of speaking for in favor of Israel.
In contrast, even renowned Jewish scholars Gideon Levy, Noam Chomsky and a leading Israeli journalist, Amira Hass, have used alternative media platforms to argue that Jews are privileged people, illustrating that Jewish protesters have no fears of being banned. I reposted Gideon Levy’s TikTok post and only got eight viewers in four days. So, challenging voices are not allowed even though they are Jews. The same is true with the journalists reporting the conflict escalates stories of the strictest form of journalism are being witnessed around the globe. Not only the Western media journalists but some Israeli journalists also “express fear” about airing “dissenting views.”
Meanwhile, the Tory government proposes to ban councils from “boycotting Israeli goods” in the wake of pro-Palestine protests.
As the conflict prolonged, tens of thousands of people of all races, creeds and professions took the long-awaited Israel-Palestine issue to the streets of Europe, Asia, Africa, North America and the Middle East. Most sections of the Western media reported both pro-Palestinian and pro-Israel protests in various cities across Europe but noticeably used dissimilar visual images and language to portray one set of protesters as “bad guys.”
In the wake of protests, several Western governments have openly proposed a ban on pro-Palestine rallies. Several democratic governments in Europe are banning, blocking, arresting and suspending a range of people for taking part in pro-Palestine protests. A few liberal media outlets, including The Guardian and Time, suggested that “free speech” in Europe is under threat. In comparison, the conservative newspaper The Daily Telegraph linked the “Israel-Hamas war” to mass migration in Europe, which it sees as a “security risk.”
Fairly speaking, all strands of the media, tabloids, broadsheets and broadcasters did not burry news of student suspension in SOAS and Harvard universities for taking part in pro-Palestine rallies but again, carefully constructed language, as The Telegraph mentioned, students’ removal was imposed not for protest but because of their conduct” thus protecting Europe facing criticism on showing double-standards over-exercising its core values including democracy, freedom of speech and equality.
Even the liberal paper, The Guardian, images show mostly protestors with headbands featuring the Kalima (declaration of faith), too often reserved for terrorists, extremists, and radicals, thus equating pro-Palestinian protestors with extremists and Jihadists. In contrast, the broadcaster shows protesters chanting slogans like “Allahu akbar” (God is Great), which corresponds with jihad. In brief, a significant piece of the media and press reporting centered around pro-Palestinian protestors, presenting them as troublemakers and bad buys.
In brief, the summation of reporting indicates a clear, disproportionate, and clearly manufactured coverage presenting pro-Palestinian protestors as troublemakers, unlawful and criminals.
The accumulated media reporting indicates the use of carefully crafted political language, endorsing like-minded views while denouncing confronted opinions on the conflict. For instance, Reuters reports show “Israeli soldiers skirmish with Hamas fighters”; CNN describes it as “Hamas and Israeli troops clash,” a phrase that symbolizes both sides fighting are equals in arms, firepower and troops, whereas Al-Jazeera and CNBC employ the expression “Israel-Hamas War” possible indicates an on-going conflict started decades ago but it only accelerated following the Hamas attack on Israel.
Notably, the Sky News anchors twisted the news by claiming that Hamas had “beheaded babies” and hence attempted to establish a connection between Hamas and al-Qaeda, Daesh terrorists.
The BBC is accused of being biased in covering the Israel-Palestine conflict.
Overall, most sections of the media lied about beheaded babies to justify Israeli war crimes. Similarly, the Israeli attack on Al-Ahli Hospital is presented as an act of Hamas rocket attack endorsing the Israeli official rhetoric; even the BBC executive accepted it was a “mistake” and “fake news.”
In Britain, tabloid press presents Israeli strikes on Gaza as retaliation for the Hamas attack, a “pure evil,” “holocaust pure and simple,” and “barbaric.” But the same newspapers refrain from calling the Israeli attack on the hospital a “massacre.”
Overall, Israel is presented as “victim” and not “aggressor,” and the Israeli attack is portrayed as “retaliation,” not “assault,” which reminded us of Robert Fisk’s view of Israel’s portrayal of Gaza as “neighborhood,” not “colony.” Moreover, there is clear evidence of inequality in the value of human lives in the media reporting of Gaza. To conclude, it is evident to say that most sections of the global media are a party in the conflict.
