So immersed has the Western media’s coverage become in the genocide perpetrated by Israel on Gaza, that it is difficult to disentangle their relentless manufacture of words and images supporting, exonerating, even applauding the Israeli war on Gaza from the actual bombardments and detonations.
A little less than a year ago, when the toll stood at 14,854 people, including 6,150 children, this column had noted two developments which could potentially alter the nature of journalism forever: the use of information as an accessory of military combat; and a strategy to consciously target and kill independent journalists covering the war.
Today, it appears the world has come full circle with over 42,000 people, including nearly 16,765 children butchered, and Gaza reduced to a strip of smouldering ruins.
The arms and ammunition used to create this scenario are not just 2,000 lb bombs or 155 mm artillery shells, but journalistic narratives systematically purveyed by some of the world’s most powerful media houses. We have now a journalism that may be termed ‘Genocidal Journalism’, one that makes the monstrous, repeated and continuous deployment of the world’s most sophisticated military might against a people stripped of all protection appear normal, justified and righteous.
To understand the basic elements of Genocidal Journalism’s master narrative, one just has to listen to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the UNGA 2024 on September 27. Excerpts:
- “Here’s the truth: Israel seeks peace … yet we face savage enemies who seek our annihilation, and we must defend ourselves against them.”
- “These savage murderers, our enemies, seek not only to destroy us, but they seek to destroy our common civilization and return all of us to a dark age of tyranny and terror.”
- “They savagely murdered 1,200 people. They raped and mutilated women. They beheaded men. They burned babies alive. They burned entire families alive – babies, children, parents, grandparents in scenes reminiscent of the Nazi Holocaust. Hamas kidnapped 251 people from dozens of different countries, dragging them into the dungeons of Gaza.”
- “The curse of October 7 began when Hamas invaded Israel from Gaza, but it didn’t end there. Israel was soon forced to defend itself on six more war fronts organized by Iran. On October 8, Hezbollah attacked us from Lebanon. Since then, they have fired over 8,000 rockets at our towns and cities, at our civilians, at our children.”
- “For nearly a year, the brave men and women of the IDF [Israel Defense Forces] have been systematically crushing Hamas’s terror army that once ruled Gaza.”
- “Ladies and gentlemen, Israel has made its choice. We seek to move forward to a bright age of prosperity and peace. Iran and its proxies have also made their choice. They want to move back to a dark age of terror and war.”
Some key words have been italicised to unpack their intent: The victimiser is made to appear the victim. The scenario painted is that of a battle between Good (us) and Bad (them); a battle between civilisation (us) and tyranny (them).
They murdered “our” people (October 7) – there’s no mention of the background of Israel’s seven decades of brutal settler colonialism, no mention of the subsequent mayhem unleashed on Gaza and now on Lebanon.
Also read: A Year of Escalating Conflict in West Asia and Millions Uprooted
The brave IDF has been waging a just war – what the IDF is doing has been judged by the world’s highest court as plausible genocide. Israel stands for a future of peace and prosperity, their opponents want to take you to an age of terror – in actual fact, Israel’s grand plan is to carry on its annihilation of Gazans until large swathes of their territory come to be acquired by it.
Genocidal Journalism is anchored in the ceaseless generation of hate, again incubated within Israel’s borders and kept alive not just for its citizens, but for the world. To keep their master narrative of the war in Gaza/Lebanon the salient one, Israel has long adopted a policy of killing Palestinian journalists and media workers (Reporters Without Borders has just put the number of fatalities at over 130, with at least 33 felled as mid-work), even while keeping its media avalanche going.
How is a supposedly democratic Israel able to conduct a genocide over 12 months without some pushback from its citizens? An eye-opening compilation of hate speech over the period since the October 7 Hamas strike may provide an answer. It shows you how paranoia and rage have become so greatly internalised among Israelis that the horizon of hate against the Palestinian and Arab is limitless.
Curiously, the rampaging fury apparent just after the October 7 Hamas attack never seems to ebb – 12 months later it remains as potent as ever thanks to unrelenting social media messaging. There are no civilisational red lines to the diatribe.
Initially much of the hate speech emanated from the highest echelons of government, including from members of the Knesset. Minister Itamar Ben Gvir was among the first to state: “Everything is ours”. His colleague, Tzvi Sukkot, filled in the gaps: “Occupy, annex, destroy all homes and build wide and large settlements, give the lands we occupy to our soldiers.” Another colleague, Avigdor Lieberman, adds, “There are no innocent people in the Gaza Strip.”
Yoav Gallant’s reference to Palestinians as “human animals” is now well-known, but how many know of his ministerial colleague’s statement that “one of the options is to drop an atomic bomb on Gaza”?
These tropes balloon out into becoming part of everyday speech. Rabbis and ordinary citizens endorsed the nuclear bomb idea enthusiastically: “If you gave me a button to erase Gaza, every single being in Gaza would no longer be living tomorrow.” Free expression is given to ideas of annihilation, mutilation, dismemberment, disfigurement: “These people there deserve death. A hard death, an agonising death…” “There are no innocents in Gaza … Every adult trained to kill. Every woman is a monster. Every boy aspires to be a martyr. Every baby will grow up to be a terrorist…”, says one; the beach at Gaza should be stained by the blood of terrorists, says another.
The vocabulary of the Holocaust is constantly evoked. The one enduring dream that emerges from the word-fest of loathing is to grab the land: “All of the land is ours, and we decide to where you move.” “Victory = Settlement”. “Make it all Israel”.
The soldiers on the frontline luxuriate in the blood bath they create, putting out regular posts of buildings set alight, live-streaming young men being used as human shields or prisoners writhing in agony under torture in ways that recall Abu Ghraib 2003 – the USA’s moment of infamy.
But Israel’s Genocide Journalism has a willing accessory, which is really the most disheartening aspect to this story. Over the last year, Western media has shown itself prepared to ignore every journalistic norm in order to ensure the hegemony of Israel’s master narrative. This could range from putting out blatant falsehoods to clever dodges carried out in the newsroom.
In November 2023, CNN’s Nic Robertson put out a “scoop”. An Arabic document on a wall in the al-Rantisi Children’s Hospital, he claimed (on the assurance of his Israeli government source) was a Hamas prisoner watch roster. It turned out to be only a plain calendar. Such blatantly wrong coverage has been immediately called out, but far less conspicuous were the subtle headlines and edits on copy that skew stories in pro-Israel ways.
UK-based media scholar Alan MacLeod recently provided some instant correctives to headlines of The Washington Post (WP) on X. One headline went: ‘Israel forces move into southern Lebanon as Middle East conflict expands’. He excised the words ‘move into’ and replaced it with one word: ‘invade’.
Another WP headline went: ‘Israel preparing for possible ground manoeuvre in Lebanon as U.N. meets’. MacLeod once again knocked off the words ‘ground maneuver’ and replaced them with ‘invasion’.
Another tweeter edited the New York Times headline, ‘A Border Crossing Shuttered for Months Traps the Sick and Wounded in Gaza’. The first six words were replaced by a single word, ‘Israel’, changing the framing completely.
In his analysis, ‘How the Media Became a Weapon in the Gaza Genocide’, Steven Methven observed: “The role of the media in covering one of the most one-sided, destructive and grotesque assaults in recent memory hasn’t simply been to conceal its excesses from its audience … Rather, by careful framing, selective omission and the strategic deployment of a sheen of ‘objectivity’, the media has functioned as an actor in this war.”
Surely a year of this monstrous war should provoke a rethink in newsrooms across the world on the ravages of Genocidal Journalism? And can we expect television channels in India, which have allowed themselves to get embedded in Israel’s military machine, to take a deep breath and introspect?
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For The Wire and its correspondent Sukanya Shantha, a major victory
It isn’t often in these times of media repression that grounded reportage on a subject that is routinely and systematically erased from public consciousness leads to a historic verdict delivered by India’s highest court.
Since 2020, Sukanya Shantha has been reporting on how caste operates in Indian prisons. The Wire recently re-published her first report, ‘From Segregation to Labour, Manu’s Caste Law Governs the Indian Prison System’ on October 3, 2024, which she had written as part of The Wire/Pulitzer Center series.
Through her investigation she had uncovered a horrendous truth: the laws of Manu are what keep Indian prisons running, not constitutional norms. Those belonging to the lowest castes are forced to perform the lowliest tasks in prison like cleaning toilets and sewers: “The arrangement was clear – those at the bottom of the caste pyramid did the cleaning work; those high above handled the kitchen or the legal documentation department. And the rich and influential did nothing … These arrangements had nothing to do with the crime that one was arrested for or his conduct in prison.”
What was even more despicable was that this caste-based division of labour was laid down in the prison manuals of most states of the country.
Once these facts came out into the open, they should have had far more impact than they did. True, the Rajasthan government of the time did amend its prison manual, but in most prisons it was business as usual. This is what persuaded Sukanya Shantha to petition the Supreme Court on the issue.
As she explained in an interview, “I was hoping that something actually works out on its own, like states voluntarily bringing in some changes. Look, as reporters, our only greed is that whatever we are reporting should actually have some impact.” Unfortunately, caste hardly figured in public discussions on the carceral system and she became increasingly conscious that this was an issue that the courts should address.
Thus began the long hard work of putting together a team to argue the public interest litigation in the Supreme Court: Disha Wadekar (Sukanya’s lawyer) then spoke to S. Prasanna – the advocate on record in this case – and retired Justice Muralidhar, who decided to take the case up pro bono. This was the team that went on to argue the petition and the rest, of course, is history.
On October 3, a Supreme Court bench headed by Chief Justice D.Y. Chandrachud along with Justices J.B. Pardiwala and Manoj Misra, struck down the provisions relating to caste-based discriminatory practices as unconstitutional. It also declared that all states and Union territories in India should revise their prison manual to ensure this.
While delivering the verdict the CJI made it a point to acknowledge and thank Sukanya Shantha for her journalism. Whether the Supreme Court’s stern words will translate on the ground and the obnoxious caste-ridden practices within our jails are ended forever is something that needs to be tracked. Sukanya Shantha, you may be sure, will be doing just that. Already, she is on to the next step of mapping the challenges that lie ahead.
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Journalists under threat, again and again
The targeting of journalists in various forms carries on without let or wide comment across the country. The Press Club of India recently took note of the unacceptable situation prevailing in the districts of Vaishali and Muzaffarpur of Bihar, now under JD(U)-BJP rule: “It appears that the district administrations in both districts have been systematically targeting journalists and incarcerating them without adhering to proper legal procedures. In these two districts journalists have been implicated in spurious cases merely for their critical reporting which has exposed the involvement of government officials in improprieties … A few months ago, two journalists were murdered in Muzaffarpur.”
Then came news of the arrest of Mahesh Langa, Gujarat correspondent for The Hindu. Many who know him personally could vouch for his credibility and many rose in his defence, but today he finds himself in jail for a case of GST evasion involving his cousin.
Langa is known to have needled the local BJP through his news reports. Just three weeks ago, he had exposed the “membership drive” of the party, where allegedly schoolchildren and their parents were “enrolled” as well as a woman and her husband who was only visiting a public health centre and who, before she knew it, became a member of the BJP.
Or take that other story that Langa filed some months ago. It exposed the tragic situation that prevails in the illegal coal mines that thrive in Gujarat’s Surendranagar district, where workers die of asphyxiation while digging for low-grade coal.
The Wire’s report, ‘Gujarat Journalist Held Over GST Fraud Not Named in FIR; ‘Arrest Not Related to Report,’ Says The Hindu’ on October 9 noted that “Langa’s arrest has generated misgivings in the media community, with many journalists vouching for his integrity and others taking note of a recent story he did on the impact of the ban on Russian-origin diamonds on Gujarat’s diamond industry.”
R. Rajagopal, The Telegraph’s editor-at-large, taking note of Langa’s unflinching journalism remarked in a recent column that Langa was the “senior most journalist from a legacy media house to face such action in recent memory.” He rightly saw the arrest as reflective of the state of the media in India today.
News reports like the ones Langa filed would certainly not have won him brownie points from the BJP’s party managers who would like to project the state as a model one. It’s more than likely, therefore, that someone in Gujarat’s power hierarchy grabbed at the chance to put Langa in jail. The move could possibly cost him his job. We sincerely hope that that will not be the case.
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Readers write in…
Bangladesh needs to do more
Roshmi Goswami and P. Saravanamuttu of the South Asians for Human Rights (SAHR), wrote in:
“SAHR is alarmed at the inadequate and irresponsible actions of the interim government of Bangladesh in addressing ongoing issues that need to be swiftly and efficiently addressed for the democratic stability of the country. With the ousting of the previous government by a mass uprising, the interim government’s priority has been to restore and maintain law and order and prepare the country for a free and fair election. However, after almost two months of being appointed, the situation of the country’s law and order remains fragile and no clear roadmap for election has been revealed. SAHR has learnt that there have been instances where certain actions taken by the interim government has further worsened the crisis at present. With regard to the recently instigated violence and killing of people in Khagrachari and Rangmati districts in the Chittagong Hill Tracts (CHT) between the Bengali settlers and the indigenous Jummu community on September 19 and 20, there had been no arrest of the perpetrators despite the members of the interim government visiting the affected area…
“Two lives have been lost due to the workers’ unrest that has been ongoing in Savar-Ahulia Gazipur industrial areas. The second death caused by a gunshot of a law enforcement official occurred on September 30. This happened after all 18 demands of the Ready Made Garment workers, including tiffin and night allowances were accepted by the factory owners in a tripartite agreement among the factory owners, the workers and the government. The normal operations of the factories were to resume on October 2. It has been reported that the second death occurred when workers were protesting due to several factories delaying fulfilling the immediate demands…The workers’ unrest has renewed due to the loss of the second life. It is clear that the use of excessive force by the law enforcement officials has intensified the situation…
“Further, SAHR learns that there have been instances that the interim government has given in to the demands of religious extremist groups. For example, the textbook review and revision committee was disbanded after the religious extremist groups demanded removing some members alleging that they hold anti-Islamic and pro-LGBTIQ rights attitudes. At least 60 shrines belonging to different faiths have also been attacked and vandalised since August. Such actions will be detrimental to the democratic values and the promotion of rights and freedoms of the people of Bangladesh as enshrined in the constitution. Further there is a potential that these consequences will be felt through the region through the spillover effect.
“Therefore, SAHR firmly urges the interim government of Bangladesh to implement the necessary actions swiftly and efficiently and to fulfil the priority of holding free, fair elections so that the country can establish a solid democratic framework.”
Write to ombudsperson@thewire.in.
