[News] Propaganda Blitz: How Mainstream Media Is Pushing Fake Palestine Stories

[Anti-Imperialist News]

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<https://www.mintpressnews.com/propaganda-blitz-how-mainstream-media-is-pushing-fake-palestine-stories/285992/>
Propaganda Blitz: How Mainstream Media Is Pushing Fake Palestine Stories
October 13, 2023 - Alan Macleod
<https://www.mintpressnews.com/author/alan-macleod/>
------------------------------

After Hamas launched a surprise attack on Israel, IDF forces responded with
airstrikes, leveling Gazan buildings. The violence so far has claimed the
lives of more than 2,500 people. Western media, however, show far more
interest and have much greater sympathy with Israeli dead than Palestinian
ones and have played their usual role as unofficial spokespersons for the
Israeli Defense Forces (IDF).
Extraordinary Claims, Zero Evidence

One case in point is the claim that, during their incursion into southern
Israel, Hamas fighters stopped to round up, kill and mutilate 40 Israeli
babies, beheading them and leaving their bodies behind.

The extraordinary assertion was originally reported by the Israeli channel
i24 News, which based it on anonymous Israeli military sources. Despite
offering no proof whatsoever, this highly inflammatory claim about an enemy
made by an active participant in a conflict was picked up and repeated
across the world by a host of media (e.g., in the United States by Fox News
<https://www.foxnews.com/world/40-babies-some-beheaded-found-israel-soldiers-hamas-attacked-village>,
CNN <https://twitter.com/abbydphillip/status/1711735223182835723>, MSN
<https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/world/hamas-murdered-40-babies-including-beheadings-israel-reports/ar-AA1hZG5G>,
Business Insider
<https://www.businessinsider.com/idf-says-hamas-decapitated-babies-in-israel-2023-10?r=US&IR=T>,
and The New York Post
<https://nypost.com/2023/10/10/hamas-kills-40-babies-and-children-beheading-some-of-them-at-israeli-kibbutz-report/>
).

Meanwhile, the front pages of the United Kingdom’s largest newspapers were
festooned <https://twitter.com/AlanRMacLeod/status/1712012544406122918>
with the story, the press outraged at the atrocity and inviting their
readers to feel the same way.

Extraordinary claims should require extraordinary evidence, and a story
like this should have been met with serious skepticism, given who was
making the claim. The first question any reporter should have asked was,
“Where is the evidence?” Given multiple opportunities to stand by it, the
IDF continually distanced itself from the claims. Nevertheless, the story
was simply too useful not to publish.
[image: Media across the western world were quick to run headlines stirring
outrage over the unsubstantiated claims]Media across the western world were
quick to run headlines stirring outrage over the unsubstantiated claims

The decapitated baby narrative was so popular that even President Biden
referenced it, claiming to have seen “confirmed” images of Hamas killing
children. This claim, however, was hastily retracted
<https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/10/12/white-house-walks-back-bidens-claim-he-saw-children-beheaded-by-hamas>
by his handlers at the White House, who noted that Biden was simply
referencing the i24 News report.

The story looked even more like a piece of cheap propaganda after it was
revealed
<https://thegrayzone.com/2023/10/11/beheaded-israeli-babies-settler-wipe-out-palestinian/>
that the key source for the claim was Israeli soldier David Ben Zion, an
extremist settler who had incited race riots against Palestinians earlier
this year, describing them as “animals” with no heart who needs to be
“wiped out.”
[image: David Ben Zion]David Ben Zion in a video from a settlement
construction site (left) and hours after he told i24 the IDF had found
babies beheaded by Hamas (right). Credit | The GrayZone

Manipulating the U.S. public into supporting the war by feeding them
atrocity propaganda about mutilating babies has a long history. In 1990,
for instance, a girl purporting to be a local nurse was brought before
Congress, where she testified that Iraqi Dictator Saddam Hussein’s men had
ripped hundreds of Kuwaiti babies from their incubators and left them to
die. The story helped whip the American public up into a pro-war fervor. It
was later revealed that it was a complete hoax dreamed up by a public
relations firm.
The Murdered Girl Who Came Back to Life

Another piece of blatantly fake news is the case of Shani Louk. Louk
attended the Supernova Festival, ambushed by Hamas. It was widely reported
that Hamas murdered her (e.g., Daily Mail
<https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12606553/Female-Israeli-soldier-killed-Hamas-paraded-truck-actually-German-tattoo-artist-30-attending-music-festival-devastated-family-say-nightmare.html>,
Marca
<https://www.marca.com/en/lifestyle/world-news/2023/10/10/6524b443268e3e16778b4574.html>,
Yahoo! News
<https://au.news.yahoo.com/shani-louk-disturbing-development-after-festivalgoers-naked-body-paraded-through-streets-224534369.html>,
TMZ
<https://www.tmz.com/2023/10/09/israel-festival-shani-louk-have-fun-last-video-kidnapped-murdered-war-attack-hamas-palestine/>,
Business Insider
<https://www.businessinsider.com/credit-card-shani-louk-naked-paraded-hamas-israel-palestine-gaza-2023-10?r=US&IR=T>),
stripped her, and paraded her naked body trophy-like through the streets on
the back of a truck. Louk’s case incited global anger and calls for an
overwhelming Israeli military response.

There was only one problem: Louk was later confirmed to be alive and in
hospital, a fact that suggests the videos of her on the back of a truck
were actually images of people saving her life by taking her to seek
medical assistance.

Few of the outlets irresponsibly publishing these wildly incendiary stories
have printed apologies or even retractions. The Los Angeles Times was one
exception: after publishing a report claiming that Palestinians had raped
Israeli civilians, it later informed
<https://twitter.com/muhammadshehad2/status/1711802752869740715> readers
that “such reports have not been substantiated.”
Lionizing Israel, Dehumanizing Palestinians

Few readers, however, see these retractions. Instead, they are left with
visceral feelings of anger and disgust towards Hamas, priming them to
support Western military action against Palestine or the wider region.

In case their audiences did not get the message, op-eds and editorials in
major newspapers hammered home this idea. The Wall Street Journal ran an
op-ed
<https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-moral-duty-to-destroy-hamas-ba626a41>
entitled “The Moral Duty to Destroy Hamas”, which insisted to readers that
“Israel is entitled to do whatever it takes to uproot this evil, depraved
culture that resides next to it.” Thus, the outlet implicitly gave Israel a
free pass to carry out whatever war crimes it wished on the civilian
population, whether that is using banned chemical weapons, cutting off
electricity and water, or targeting ambulances or United Nations officials.
[image: BBC Bias Israel]The BBC told its readers that Israelis have been
“killed” while people in Gaza merely “died,” removing any agency from its
perpetrators and almost suggesting their deaths were natural

The National Review’s editorial board was of a similar mind, stating
<https://www.nationalreview.com/2023/10/israel-needs-a-long-leash-to-destroy-hamas/>
that “Israel needs a long leash to destroy Hamas.” This long leash, they
explained, meant giving Israel far more time to carry out the destruction
of Gaza. Western leaders would have to refrain from criticizing Israel or
calling for calm and peace.

The message was clear: international unity was paramount at this time. Mere
trifles such as war crimes must be overlooked. And while Israel and its
people were treated with special sympathy (e.g., Washington Post
<https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2023/10/09/israel-hamas-americans/>),
the other side was written off as bloodthirsty radicals. While the phrase
“Palestinian terrorists” could be found across the media spectrum (e.g., Fox
News
<https://www.foxnews.com/politics/judge-lets-lawsuit-claiming-biden-admin-knew-us-funds-aiding-palestinian-terrorists-move-forward>,
New York Post
<https://nypost.com/2023/10/11/hamas-palestinian-terrorists-raised-nearly-100m-in-crypto/>,
New York Times
<https://www.nytimes.com/2023/10/10/world/middleeast/israel-gaza-war-hamas-deaths-killings.html>),
its opposite, “Israeli terrorists” was completely absent from corporate
media. This, despite casualties on the Palestinian side outnumbering
Israelis.

Underlining the fact that Israeli lives are deemed more important is the
way in which deaths from each side are reported. The BBC, for example, told
<https://twitter.com/AlanRMacLeod/status/1711462615963045898> its readers
that Israelis have been “killed” while people in Gaza merely “died,”
removing any agency from its perpetrators and almost suggesting their
deaths were natural.
Context-Free Violence

Missing from most of the reporting was the basic factual background of the
attack. Few articles mentioned that Israel was built upon an existing
Palestinian state, and that most of the inhabitants of Gaza are descended
from refugees ethnically cleansed from southern Israel in order to make way
for a Jewish state. Also left unmentioned was that Israel controls almost
every aspect of Gazan’s life. This includes deciding who can enter or leave
the densely populated strip and limiting the import of food, medicine and
other crucial goods. Aid groups have called Gaza “the world’s largest
open-air prison.” The United Nations has declared
<https://www.un.org/unispal/document/gaza-unliveable-un-special-rapporteur-for-the-situation-of-human-rights-in-the-opt-tells-third-committee-press-release-excerpts/>
the conditions in Gaza to be so bad as to be unlivable.

One of the principal reasons that this crucial context is not given is that
it could influence Western audiences into sympathizing with Palestinians or
supporting Palestinian liberation. Giant media corporations are largely
owned by wealthy oligarchs or by transnational corporations, both of whom
have a stake in preserving the status quo and neither of whom wish to see
national liberation movements succeed.

Some media outlets make this explicit. Axel Springer – the enormous German
broadcaster that owns *Politico* – requires its employees to sign its
mission statement endorsing “the trans-Atlantic alliance and Israel” and
has told
<https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/israel-palestine-axel-springer-tells-staff-quit-anti>
any staff members that support Palestine to leave their jobs.

Other outlets are slightly less overt but nonetheless have Israel red lines
that employees cannot cross. CNN fired
<https://www.aljazeera.com/program/the-listening-post/2018/12/9/the-six-words-that-got-marc-lamont-hill-fired-from-cnn>
anchor Marc Lamont Hill for calling for a free Palestine. Katie Halper was
fired
<https://jacobin.com/2022/10/hill-rising-katie-halper-israel-palestine-fired>
from The Hill for (accurately <https://news.un.org/en/story/2022/03/1114702>)
calling Israel an Apartheid state. The Associated Press dismissed
<https://www.theguardian.com/media/2021/may/21/associated-press-emily-wilder-fired-pro-palestinian-views>
Emily Wilder after it became known that she had been a pro-Palestine
activist during her college years. And The Guardian sacked
<https://reason.com/2021/02/10/nathan-robinson-the-guardian-israel-tweet-joke-column/>
Nathan J. Robinson after he made a joke mocking US military aid to Israel.
These cases serve as examples to the rest of the journalistic world. The
message is that one cannot criticize the Israeli government’s violent
apartheid system or show solidarity for Palestine without risking losing
their livelihoods.

Ultimately, then, corporate media play a key role in maintaining the
occupation by manipulating public opinion. If the American people were
aware of the history and the reality of Israel/Palestine, the situation
would be untenable. For those wishing to maintain the unequal state of
affairs whereby an apartheid government expels or imprisons its indigenous
population, the pen is as important as the sword.

Feature photo | Illustration by MintPress News

*Alan MacLeod <https://twitter.com/AlanRMacLeod> is Senior Staff Writer
for MintPress News. After completing his PhD in 2017 he published two
books: Bad News From Venezuela: Twenty Years of Fake News and Misreporting
<https://www.routledge.com/Bad-News-from-Venezuela-Twenty-years-of-fake-news-and-misreporting/Macleod/p/book/9781138489233>
and Propaganda
in the Information Age: Still Manufacturing Consent
<https://www.routledge.com/Propaganda-in-the-Information-Age-Still-Manufacturing-Consent-1st-Edition/MacLeod/p/book/9781138366404?fbclid=IwAR2xQQWJd98C25wapG4ynmlEnGvL5wxG_mp5RwpBwtwPDxInjNZ1Oo7KD-E>,
as
well as a
<https://journalcontent.mediatheoryjournal.org/index.php/mt/article/view/65/56>
number
<https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0306396818823639#articleShareContainer>
of
<https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/blar.12940> academic
<https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fcomm.2018.00064/full> articles
<https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0896920518820934>. He has
also contributed to FAIR.org <https://fair.org/author/alan-macleod/>, The
Guardian <https://www.theguardian.com/profile/alan-macleod>, Salon
<https://www.salon.com/writer/alan-macleod>, The Grayzone
<https://thegrayzone.com/author/alan-macleod/>, Jacobin Magazine
<https://jacobinmag.com/author/alan-macleod>, and Common Dreams
<https://www.commondreams.org/author/alan-macleod>.*

* Republish our stories! * MintPress News is licensed under a Creative
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