‘Disappearing’ Hamas
We are witnessing a new type of war.
One where victory is not measured by the military defeat of the enemy or territory captured. But one where victory is sought and measured in the realm of international public opinion.
This is the first war where the primary battlefield is the international media, both legacy and digital social media. It is a war for the ‘hearts and minds’ of the international community that then seeks to pressure Western governments and shape policy .
This is a war that weaponises the suffering of civilians, not as a corollary of war, but as its main currency.
This is a war that legitimises sexual violence as resistance.
It is not a guerrilla war such as the Vietnam war against the U.S. where the Viet Cong fought amongst civilians. In Gaza, Hamas is utilising civilians as its first line of defence for its underground bases below hospitals, schools and mosques.
Most significantly, the war in Gaza is the only war that has been strategically waged through front pages, screens and posts, with the cooperation of much of the international media.
Hamas knew it could not defeat Israel militarily, so it crafted a global strategy where it controls the information that flows from Gaza. The cooperation of the media ensures that the Hamas narrative is amplified.
The distinctive feature of the coverage is that the media has been complicit in ‘disappearing’ the role and responsibility of Hamas in the instigation, conduct and duration of the war in Gaza.
What we have seen is a symbiotic relationship between Hamas and much of the local and international media wherein the central role of Hamas is minimised. It is almost ‘disappeared’. This coverage of Hamas has effectively ‘cleaned up’ Hamas’ image as a terrorist organisation.
There are 5 keys ways in which the media has “disappeared” Hamas.
FIRST, rarely do the news broadcasts refer to Hamas as the Government of Gaza despite it ruling Gaza for the last 19 years. Israel withdrew from Gaza in 2005. Hamas was elected in 2006 and then seized power and continued to govern without elections. But the international media throughout their coverage of the Israel-Gaza war only refer to “Hamas militants”, “Gaza militants”, “militant groups”, ‘Palestinian authorities”.
This effectively absolves the official Government of Gaza of both the responsibility for instigating the war and its conduct. It is as if the war, murder, rape and mutilation of 1200 Israeli civilians and the kidnapping of 250 hostages was carried out merely by disparate, uncontrollable armed groups from Gaza. The reality is that on October 7th 2023 the Hamas Government executed a war strategy and political plan that had been well rehearsed and generously equiped militarily and financially by Qatar.
SECOND, the media has ‘disappeared’ the culpability of the Hamas Government for the death toll of Palestinian civilians in Gaza. The media legitimately shows Israeli bombing and the civilian casualties and destruction. But at no time do they report the direct responsibility of the Hamas Government for the escalating death toll.
From the outset of the war, Hamas has prohibited Palestinian civilians from sheltering in the over 500 kilometres of underground tunnels. The Ukrainian Government provides Ukrainian civilians shelter in tunnels from Russian bombing. But Hamas reserves these tunnels only for its fighters and operatives. It spent years and millions of dollars preparing for this war and constructing these fortified tunnels, but it did not build bomb shelters for the Palestinian people.
Right from the outset of the war, Mousa Abu Marzouk, a member of the Hamas Political Bureau in an interview broadcast on MEMRI TV (Middle East Media Research Institute) said that “ the tunnels in Gaza were built to protect Hamas fighters from airstrikes, not civilians.” He added that since 75% of the residents in the Gaza Strip are refugees, it is the responsibility of the United Nations and Israel to protect them. https://www.memri.org/reports/hamas-official-mousa-abu-marzouk-tunnels-gaza-were-built-protect-hamas-fighters-not
Palestinian death and suffering are intentionally converted into international outrage and political capital for Hamas. Hamas is the only source the media uses when it uncritically broadcasts their statistics of an escalating death toll that now surpasses 60,000. These figures are cited as official information by the “Gaza Health Ministry” or “Palestinian officials”. They are not identified as Hamas officials. In addition, there is often no mention of the fact that the figures are unverified or that they do not distinguish between fighters and civilians. A former AP journalist recently reported that he had been threatened by Hamas to self-censor information in an AP report that “Hamas fighters dressed as civilians were being counted as civilians in the death toll.” From 2008, he said, “AP like all of its sister organisations collaborates with Hamas censorship.” https://x.com/EasternVoices/status/1952676770555072961
Historian and photography expert Gerhard Paul told the Süddeutsche Zeitung: “In southern Gaza, Hamas controls 100 percent of image production.” Time magazine is now facing accusations that its cover photo taken by a Palestinian photographer of children with empty food pots was staged.
There is widespread criticism of Israel for blocking the entry of international journalists into Gaza. But there is little investigation or criticism of Hamas’ reported use of threats and censorship to control reporting from Gaza.
THIRD, most of the international media ‘disappear’ the role of Hamas in using aid as a weapon of war. The coverage and the blame for the starvation of Palestinian civilians is placed exclusively on the Israeli Government. Undoubtedly Israeli blockades and the reduction in supplies are a key cause of the aid catastrophe, but they are not the only cause.
Over the past two years most of the international media has failed to cover Hamas’ relationship with the U.N. and other aid organisations. As the ruling authority in Gaza, Hamas has exercised power over the distribution of aid including diverting, stealing and taxing aid.
“Hamas actually wants a famine in Gaza. Producing mass death from hunger is the group’s final play, its last hope for ending the war in a way that advances its goals. Hamas has benefited from Israel’s decision to use food as a lever against the terror group, because the catastrophic conditions for civilians have generated an international outcry, which is worsening Israel’s global standing and forcing it to reverse course.” This was written by Ahmed Fouad Alkhatib in The Atlantic on July 31st. He is the head of Realign For Palestine, a project of the Atlantic Council where he is a resident senior fellow. He is a Gaza native and a political analyst who writes extensively on strategic affairs in the Middle East.https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2025/07/hamas-wants-famine/683724/?utm_source=apple_news
FOURTH, for almost two years, the media has ‘disappeared’ the role of Hamas in the starvation and suffering of Israeli hostages in Gaza. They covered the hostage exchanges that Hamas staged as propaganda parades featuring masked, heavily armed fighters. But there has been little if any reporting on the hostages being murdered in captivity or about others held in cages, in airless tunnels, starved, tortured and sexually abused. Hospital examinations of released hostages show their severe nutritional, medical and psychological condition, but these hospital reports and testimonies have been largely ignored by the international media. For the most part, they have not carried out extensive interviews with released Israeli hostages.
It is only a few videos of skeletal Israeli hostages such as Evyatar David and Rom Braslavski that were given any international coverage. It could well be that the media was seeking to deflect criticism for prominently featuring unverified images of Palestinian children who were suffering from serious pre-existing medical conditions as though they were victims of starvation.
FIFTH, the global media has ‘disappeared’ the use of sexual violence as a weapon of war by the Hamas Government of Gaza.
Whereas in the past, sexual violence was considered a by-product of war, international law now recognises the use of Conflict-Related Sexual Violence (CRSV) as strategic tool to degrade and dehumanise a group or nation and spread fear. It constitutes a crime against humanity.
But it was only on 14 August 2025, almost two years since Hamas’ assault on Israel on October 7 2023, that the UN Secretary-General acknowledged that Hamas has used sexual violence as a weapon of war. He announced that therefore he has now added Hamas to the blacklist of organizations that commit “ repeated patterns” of Conflict-Related Sexual Violence.
The term “ repeated patterns” is used to make it clear that the use of sexual violence in armed conflict is not incidental or random but constitutes intentional and deliberate acts of war.
This is a significant news story, but was was not given much attention in news programs, despite media regularly broadcasting news from U.N. representatives.
In fact, António Guterres was presented over a year and a half ago with a formal U.N. Report on the use of CRSV by Hamas. In all this time, he did nothing about it and was not challenged by the media.
In March 2024 a report to the U.N. Secretary-General by the Special Representative on Sexual Violence in Conflict confirmed widespread CRSV by Hamas on October 7th 2023 including rape, gang rapes “genital mutilation, sexualized torture, or cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment”.
The Report also stated that with regard to hostages there are “reasonable grounds to believe that such violence may be ongoing.” https://news.un.org/en/sites/news.un.org.en/files/atoms/files/Mission_report_of_SRSG_SVC_to_Israel-oWB_29Jan_14_feb_2024.pdf
And indeed, multiple released Israeli hostages confirmed that Hamas continued sexual violence against them during captivity in Gaza.
But despite the U.N. Report, despite investigations such as The Civil Commission on Oct. 7th Crimes Against Women and Children https://www.civilc.org/ and The Dinah Report https://thedinahproject.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/07/The-Dinah-Project-full-report-A4-pages_web-2.pdf, the use of sexual violence by Hamas has received scant attention over the last two years by global media. The fact that Hamas terrorists filmed and uploaded to social media real-time footage of themselves raping and committing sexual atrocities against Israelis on October 7 has been glossed over.
This has serious implications beyond a lack of truth in reporting. The alarming message the media is sending by ignoring Hamas’ CRSV crimes, is that sexual violence is affirmed as legitimate resistance. We see this on posters declaring ‘By Any Means Necessary’ held during demonstrations.
The international media would do well to examine their role in ‘disappearing’ critical, truthful coverage of Hamas. This has enabled Hamas to weaponise the media as part of its global war strategy.
‘ Disappearing’ Hamas in international media coverage has effectively disconnected Hamas from any direct responsibility for the suffering of Palestinian civilians.
‘Disappearing’ Hamas has effectively disconnected Hamas from responsibility for the continuation of the war. Millions of demonstrators worldwide have been demanding that Israel end the war, but there are no posters or demands that Hamas release the hostages.
‘Disappearing’ Hamas from the very beginning of Israel’s military response, has enabled the war to be presented as one that Israel is waging against Palestinian civilians in Gaza. And consequently, the international media has run with the narrative that it is a genocide, irrespective of any final decision by the International Court of Justice.
Without the role of the international media, Hamas would not have succeeded in blotting out the massacre of October 7 and the captivity of the hostages. Without facilitation of the media, Hamas would not have been able to seize victory in the realm of international public opinion in this new type of war.
