Israel and the Media

After the horrible and tragic events in Paris it’s been a week of extensive media coverage on every channel, every newspaper the world over has dealt with this awful event. Yet in amongst the stories there is once again the tired old cliché of blaming Israel for it.

Most of those pointing the finger are harmless people posting on
Twitter or Facebook, either genuinely believing what they have read or
just hoping to provoke a reaction. It does not help that comments made
by politicians make their way into the press and fan the flames of
hate towards Israel at a time when the headlines should be ‘we want
peace and we stand together.’ Instead the press, through poor wording
or just stupidity, seems to turn the anger towards Israel.

Many times I have read headlines about a Palestinian being shot by
Israel and for some people that is enough for them, they don’t read any more and hear the full story, the reason why they were shot, they just
assume once again evil Israel is picking on the Palestinians.

What can be done to change this? Even social media seems to be
anti-Israel! Last month Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas claimed
that Israel had executed a 13-year-old boy after he and his cousin
stabbed two people. Israel acted quickly to show this was a lie, but
how much damage was done by his statement to the media, how many more people saw Israel as child killers?

The truth is in war, the media; social and printed is a more powerful
tool than weapons. It can make people believe anything and do far more
damage and that is more scary than anything a gun can do.