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Rabat – For decades, different media outlets have heavily reported on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. However, and for the longest time, this media coverage of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict has faced scrutiny for its bias.
Although the ethics of journalism demands objectivity in reporting, media companies have tended to favor sensationalism over accuracy. The news media, or the fourth estate, is a powerful entity that can shape and alter public opinion on a particular subject.
This is why objectivity in reporting is essential to be fair to all parties and accurately portray the realities on the ground.
Recently, media coverage about the Israeli- Palestinian conflict resurfaced amid the latest escalation of tensions between the two. The outburst of hostilities was heavily mediatized by various reputable news outlets, including the New York Times, the Guardian, and Al Jazeera.
However, the question we should be asking is whether or not the reporting fairly represented both sides or only chose to promote a single narrative. Staying neutral when reporting about war and violence can be tricky, and using certain words may result in siding with one party over the other.
The New York Times, for instance, was accused of siding with Israel when reporting on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Biases in reporting about the conflict in the New York times is not a new phenomenon, as analysis of previous coverage of the Intifada and the Palestinian liberation struggle indicates New York Times’ biases in reporting.
New research by MIT titled “The New York Times distorts the Palestinian struggle” highlights yet another textbook case of the failure of NYT to report on the conflict accurately.
In the paper, the author demonstrated how the NYT’s coverage, since the First and Second Intifada, has persistently sided with Israel through the choice of language and framing.
The style and choice of words have a much more considerable impact than we would like to think. Using words such a “died” for Palestinians and “killed” for Israelis inadvertently trivializes Palestinian casualties.
This reporting style does come across as biased because it is essentially siding with a party through the subtleties of language.
Moreover, passive voice when talking about “killed” Palestinians while using active voice for the Israeli side further illustrates the bias.
This type of coverage ultimately fails to hold the responsible parties accountable for their violence and thus does not render justice to the persecuted people.
The latest escalation of violence came after Israel ordered Palestinians from Sheikh Jarrah to evacuate their houses.
Sheikh Jarrah is a predominantly Palestinian neighborhood in East Jerusalem. Israel ordered six families to leave their houses on May 2 after an Israeli court ruled in favor of Jewish settlers.
The families were driven out of their houses to replace the whole district with Jewish settlements. The court also ruled that seven families have to leave before August 1. According to Al Jazeera, this will result in the displacement of 58 people, including 17 children.
Even so, the violence of evicting Palestinians from their houses was disguised by prominent Western news outlets with words like “the effort to evict …families from a contested neighborhood,” and the unequal confrontation between civilians and Israeli soldiers was described as “clashes between the two sides.”
Although these journalists might brush off accusations of bias by describing their reporting as balanced, such arguments can be easily debunked.
When documenting the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, balanced reporting needs to take into account the imbalance of power between the only nuclear power in the Middle East and Palestinian civilians who suffer the most from this situation.
This is not to minimize the casualties of ordinary Israeli citizens, but it is clear that the scale of destruction is far more considerable on the Palestinian side.
If the fighting is allegedly between Israel and Hamas as claimed by Israeli authorities, this does not excuse bombing civilian areas. Even when authorities notify people to evacuate buildings before the bombing, targeting a heavily populated place such as Gaza will inevitably result in mass civilian casualties.
Now, of course, none of this excuses Hamas’ role in escalating the conflict, a tactic that is counterproductive and that has allowed Israel to continue bombing the Gaza strip and justifying its actions as “self-defense.”
The bloodshed has continued to take innocent lives, with Palestinians registering the highest number of casualties.
In such a case, accurate reporting needs to condemn the violence and highlight the imbalance of power between the two sides.
Since B’Tselem started tracking the number of deaths due to the conflict for the past 14 years, it is clear that the number of killed Palestinians surpassed Israeli casualties.
B’tselem is a mainstream Israeli group tracking human rights abuses against Palestinians.
Overall, B’Tselem data indicates that 87% of deaths are on the Palestinian side and 13% only for Israel. Roughly, this means that Palestinians are 15 times more likely to get killed than Israeli people.
The conflict indeed impacts Palestinian and Israeli civilians, but the data shows that the impact is more felt on the Palestinian side.
When the violence disproportionately impacts one party more than the other, journalists need to choose the language to describe the situation accurately.
The reality of this conflict is that civilians are the ones who suffer from this situation (with the majority being Palestinians), without any prospect for a settlement of the problem.
As the more powerful side in this confrontation, Israel bears the responsibility for the current crisis that doesn’t do anything to improve the lives of the people suffering from it.
Furthermore, reporting on such a long-standing conflict necessarily means news outlets must provide context for their writing.
However, this doesn’t seem to be the practice on the ground as different news media pick and choose the angle for the story to convey a specific narrative.
Also indicative of this trend of journalistic bias is the BBC, whose evidently biased reporting on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is observable in their latest stories on the issue.
In BBC’s report about the fighting, Israelis “are killed by fired rockets” whereas Palestinians casualties are referred to by “death toll.”
This terminology that showcases the media’s double standards is rather motivated by a political agenda than journalistic objectivity.
Amid international outcry over civilian casualties, Western news media, including the New York times and the BBC, have exaggerated the defensive acts of Pro-Palestine supporters while underlining Israel’s right to defend itself as a justification for the violence being perpetrated.
As Malcolm X famously said: “If you aren’t careful, the newspapers will have you hating the people who are being oppressed and loving the people who are doing the oppressing.”
This quote perfectly encapsulates the way the media has shaped the narrative at the expense of reporting on the realities of persecuted populations.
Journalistic “objectivity” should not remain an abstract concept, as the media professionals have a duty and sacred responsibility to tell the truth to their audiences.
Sensational headlines and stories should not be the drivers of journalistic practice, nor should they be influential factors for framing important stories that shape our modern realities.
Journalists should be aware of their mission of balanced reporting and should constantly fight to preserve the spirit of authenticity and accuracy in their reporting.
Journalists must speak up about self-censorship in the media, particularly on the issue of Israel and Palestine.
This way, people will be better informed on a long-standing conflict that has taken many innocent lives over the years.
