Jérôme Bourdon, a historian and sociologist specializing in the media, has lived in Israel since 1997. He analyzes the ways in which Israeli television and newspapers have been covering the ongoing war in Gaza, and the impacts of their work on Israeli society.

After six months of conflict, what do Israelis see of the war in Gaza in the media?

The small minority of people in Israel who believe that a ceasefire is necessary or that the army is committing deliberate atrocities in Gaza read the daily newspaper Haaretz or independent news websites like Hamakom Hachi Ham Begehenom ("The Hottest Place in Hell") or +972 Magazine, get their news from the international press or from the websites of Israeli human rights associations. Those who want to know what is happening in Gaza can also rely on the accounts of humanitarians from all backgrounds, all of whom say they have never seen such a disaster. However, these personalities are not interviewed in the mainstream media. Israeli journalists, like the rest of the global press, are forbidden to access Gaza [apart from reports by embedded journalists, which last a few hours and are under the army's control].

The vast majority of Israel's Jewish population does not see or does not want to see the Gazans' suffering. The far right, deep down, welcomes it, and some groups are trying to prevent humanitarian aid trucks from entering the Gaza Strip. Even those who claim to be on the left and in favor of peace admit that they feel little or no empathy. The population remains mentally stuck on what happened on October 7, 2023, when a new level of horror was reached. The echo of the Holocaust is powerful. Israelis remain convinced that the country went to war because "we had no choice." They know that this suffering exists, but deep down, Palestinian responsibility is always put forward. It's an old issue, that was well expressed in a famous and currently much-repeated quote by Golda Meir [Israel's prime minister from 1969 to 1974]: "We cannot forgive the Palestinians for forcing us to kill their children."

Israel's responsibility is not being questioned, except by a very small minority of journalists, activists and intellectuals. The media show the public what it wants to see; and the public does not understand that this pain, which is so present for them, is already a thing of the past for the foreign media, and that, moreover, it's not commensurable with the disaster befalling the Palestinians as a result of Israel's military offensive. Israel's English-language media participate in the hasbara, or "propaganda-explanation," efforts aimed at foreigners; but this only convinced those who are already convinced.

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