Over its 17-year reign in the Gaza Strip, Hamas has sought to manipulate the way that local Palestinians and foreign journalists report on hostilities with the IDF, seeking to control the narrative and sway the minds of uninformed audiences around the world.Through Hamas’ issuance of constricting media guidelines in 2014 and 2022, its use of violence against opposition journalists, the recently unearthed evidence of collaboration by certain Palestinian freelancers with the terror group, and its propaganda campaigns focused on influencing mainstream media outlets, it is clear that any news emerging from Gaza must be treated with a critical eye and not taken at face value.
One way to see this is by looking at Syria.
The Washington Post writes about how the Syrian Assad regime secret police were everywhere and people had to speak in code because of fear of being betrayed by informants.
For decades, Syrians passed down a warning from one generation to the next: “The walls have ears.” In cafes, taxis and markets — even in their own living rooms — most could not speak freely, fearing they might be overheard by Bashar al-Assad’s mukhabarat, or secret police. To maintain its grip, the Assad regime planted fear, its roots spreading into every aspect of civilian life. Street cleaners, garbage collectors, balloon sellers, colleagues — anyone could be an informant.
The article describes the fear that Syrians felt in expressing their true feelings because of the potential consequences of imprisonment, torture or death.
Great story, right? Journalism at its finest, right?
But this has been happening for decades. Hundreds of thousands of Syrians have fled the country. Any mainstream media reporter could have talked to Syrian refugees in Europe and written this story years ago.
And few of them did, as far as I can tell. (There were rare exceptions.)
When people live in such an environment, everything they say is self-censored. They know that if their statements make it back to the government, they can suffer severe consequences.
This has been what Gaza is like since 2007. Hamas' state security may not be as professional or as extensive as Assad's, but the fear and self-censorship is the same.
Gazans know that there is one acceptable narrative that they can say out loud. And they play their role well. The reporters and NGO workers who interview them know the game - either they are Hamas sympathizers who the people will not tell the truth to, or they are fellow suspects who could be tortured if they publish something not to Hamas' liking.
Why aren't these articles being written before the autocratic regimes fall? Why are we not seeing articles about Gaza and the fear that Gazans still have for even the weakened Hamas?
Because journalists aren't the brave Fourth Estate they project themselves to be to the world. They are cowards. Or they are on the side of the Assads and the Deifs, playing their role in the cognitive war.
Either way, they are not dedicated to telling the truth. They are happily doing the work of the regimes they are covering, and covering for.
News consumers and the people who read NGO reports are being lied to. The reporters know it, and the interviewees know it. The only people who don't know it are the people who still trust the media and NGOs to be honest sources of information.
Lying has been a key component of the current Gaza war from the start, as pat of Hamas' strategy. If journalists don't mention that in every article quoting Hamas or interviewing Gazans, that puts them on Hamas' side.
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