Palestine: When Western Journalist’s Lost Their Spine

Photo by Ehimetalor Akhere Unuabona / @mettyunuabona via Unsplash

I remember watching the fallout from Hurricane Katrina on TV as a kid. I couldn’t have been older than nine or ten. I remember seeing a tall, white-haired Anderson Cooper with one hand clutching a microphone, his other wrapped tight around the waist of the woman he’d been interviewing in consolation. He’d asked about what she was going to do next and how she would go on, and I remember watching her face crumple with the weight of her grief. She- like many- had lost everything in the wake of the hurricane: her home, family members, her belongings. Her fortitude had stunned me, even as a child. The other thing I remember was being surprised by how Cooper treated her. He looked visibly moved by her testimony and gave her the space to talk uninterrupted. His behavior starkly contrasted me with all the other suited journalists who sat behind desks, relaying the most heartbreaking news in the same robotic, monotonous tones. He was warm, funny, stern, and firm when he needed to be, and whether I was aware of it at the time or not, his brand of journalism struck me as the only admirable form.  

He went to dangerous places and reported on global issues while highlighting the people behind the headlines. This was, of course, before I had the language to diagnose this brand of ‘white savior’ reporting,’ where international (usually Western) journalists gain acclaim for playing progressive knights in shining armor in ‘third world countries.’ He became a hero of sorts, a man who was unafraid to ask difficult questions and stick up for the truth.

It has, therefore, been alarming to watch him- and all he represents- melt into a puddle of professional hypocrisy these last few weeks.

Western media has a moral superiority complex rooted in the upholding of what they call ‘news values.’ In journalism school, they served as a quiet manifesto and guideline to help shape the process of news production: You cannot platform one side of a political debate without also platforming the other, and you cannot report on a matter without giving people the opportunity to defend themselves, you may not make assertions morally, the language you use must remain neutral, you must cross-examine all sources and their claims, checking and counter-checking any information that they are given, you cannot act as the stenographer to a state and must reserve all rights to determine your agenda as a news organization, free from the interference of hostile states. 

What an endlessly astonishing thing it has been, then, to watch the same media who brag about how diligent their reporting is break every single one of their own rules as they refuse to follow their own parameters and ethical codes. The BBC, the New York Times, and others published uncorroborated propaganda claims about Hamas raping women and beheading babies, with the IDF themselves having to come forward and clarify that there was no proof of such claims. Sky News had to apologize after insinuating on several occasions that a Palestinian politician was a Hamas sympathizer. 

Decolonizers and Palestinians who are talking about losing loved ones to Israel’s bombardment are presented with the same unoriginal, barely coded question on air: ‘Do you condemn Hamas?’ while the same journalists refuse to ask allies of the Israeli government if they condemn the continued violation of international law Netanyahu and his cabinet are current under investigation for by the International Criminal Court. CNN and Sky News both admitted that any reporting they’re doing in the region is corroborated and controlled by the IDF, their coverage, and what they can film editorially restricted by the entity they are meant to hold accountable. Reporting that Israelis were killed while Palestinians simply died, removing the weight of responsibility off Israel as if a mysterious disease took these thousands of lives as if their killings are not systematic and continued and government policy. Israeli children are rightfully called children, while Palestinians are ‘teenage males’ or ‘adults under the age of eighteen.’ Gone is the soft, human touch of Anderson Cooper, who now tries to ensnare guests into calling Palestinians barbaric, who currently sits exclusively behind a desk in a suit, calling a genocide anything but the words ‘conflict,’ ‘war,’ and ‘unrest’ roll from him and his colleague’s lips with alarming, shameless ease. Where is the truth they claimed to worship? 

Because when it comes to Palestine, the truth is profoundly uncomplicated. 

Countless human rights organizations, including Amnesty International, Save the Children, and the World Health Organization, hundreds of genocide experts, including the former head of the United Nations New York office (who resigned over his agency’s handling of Israel’s crimes), historians, and journalists have called Israel a genocidal state. Israel has been under investigation by the International Criminal Court since 2014, with countries like Djibouti now referring this renewed escalation in Israeli aggression- this second Nakba- to the Court once more. If the endless videos of hospitals and mosques and churches and bakeries and libraries and schools being bombed by Israel (actions that are again illegal), if the statements being made by government officials who said, outright, that they were enacting the next stage of ‘ethnic cleansing,’ if the IDF did not brag about bombing Al Shifa hospital on Facebook if Netanyahu had not held up a map of Israel that no longer had East Jerusalem, The West Bank or Gaza on it in front of the General Assembly earlier this year, the lack of definitive position on Palestine in Western media would make sense. But this evidence does exist, and the choice to ignore it is an editorial one that speaks to a concerning inability to hold oppressors accountable if it isn’t profitable- or popular- to do so. 

 They haven’t just betrayed their professional responsibility, the ideals and standards they promised to uphold as media workers, and these news organizations have also betrayed their colleagues internationally. According to the Committee to Protect Journalists, Israel has killed 57 journalists since October 7th . 11 journalists are severely injured. Three are reported missing. 19 were reported ‘arrested.’ The organization also reported that journalists are being targeted with tear gas and unidentified bullets while reporting from areas they were told were ‘media safe zones.’

Covering the Israeli apartheid government has been the deadliest assignment for journalists in decades, and what has the response been by the media here? Silence. 

Despite it being a dangerous precedent to set for future regimes and a clear violation of the Geneva Convention (which states that ‘journalists engaged in dangerous professional missions in areas of armed conflict shall be considered as civilians’), the papers and publications with the most power in the West have made no unified statement to condemn Israel for their crimes against their profession. American news organizations crossed even political lines to condemn former President Donald Trump when he revoked one of their colleague’s press passes, rebuking it as an attempt to silence a free press. They do not seem in such a hurry to condemn a genocidal state’s continued assault on the media, however, perhaps because the people being killed are brown journalists.

If they are not dead, these reporters live in fear for their lives, like Al Jazeera’s Anas Al Shareef, whom Israeli officers directly threatened to stop his coverage in the region. Plestia Alaqad, a young Palestinian journalist, has fled her home because of the systemic targeting of media workers, with another famous journalist, Motaz, repeatedly reported being hunted and bombs dropped wherever he is writing from. 

Israel is going out of their way to intimidate the media organizations doing vital reporting on their crimes because to silence those collecting proof is to stifle the global uprising. They’re issuing thinly veiled threats, with Israel’s Communication minister Shlomo Karhi referring to independent media organization Haaretz as publishing ‘lying defeatist propaganda’ that ‘undermines Israel at a time of war.’ We all know what they did to Shireen Abu Akleh and how they disrespected her even in death.

This is incredibly simple to understand. Every single journalist operating in the West who refuses to use their position in the newsroom to condemn this apparent attack on our profession is arming Israel- and other oppressive states- with the knowledge that there are two tiers of journalists: ones who the West cares to defend, and disposable ones. This moment has served as a clearing of the mist for many of us journalists of color.

We see you clearly now. We see that the ideals you preach and the ‘bravery’ you speak of are a façade, an egotistical over-evaluation of your convictions and morality. Because when it matters, you are all aligned with the oppressive powers you were supposed to question. Your colonial roots overtook your respect for our profession, for your beloved ‘news values.’ You will never know what it is like to be heroes. 

Being a hero is having the people you are investigating kill your entire family like they did to Wael Dahdouh, praying salah over their dead bodies still in your press vest and helmet, and then coming back to work the next day with tears in your eyes and a promise to keep going. Bravery is Motaz Azaiza, Plestia Alaqad, and Hind Khoudary, who have watched their entire lives catch fire, their schools and universities, the neighborhoods they grew up in all reduced to dust and still choosing to pick up a camera and relay to us the truth because you refuse to. 

Mohamed Mouin Ayyash. 

Mohamed Nabil Al-Zaq.

Farah Omar.

Rabih Al Maamari.

Ayat Khadoura.

Alaa Taher Al- Hassanat.

Bilal Jadallah.

Abdelhalim Awad.

Sari Mansour.

Hassouneh Salim.

Mostafa El Sawaf. 

Amro Salah Abu Hayah.

Mossab Ashour.

Ahmed Fatima.

Yaacoub Al-Barsh.

Ahmed Al-Qara. 

Yahya Abu Manih.

Mohamed Abu Hassira.

Mohamed Al Jaja.

Mohamed Al Bayyari.

Mohammed Abu Hatab.

Majd Fadl Arandas.

Iyad Matar.

Imad Al-Wahidi.

Majed Kashko.

Nazmi Al- Nadim.

Yasser Abu Namous.

Duaa Sharaf.

Jamal Al-Faqaawi.

Saed Al-Halabi. 

Ahmed Abu Mhadi. 

Salma Mkhaimer.

Mohammed Imad Labad.

Roshi Sarraj.

Mohammed Ali.

Khalil Abu Aathra.

Sameeh Al- Nady.

Mohammad Balousha.

Issar Bhar.

Abdulhadi Habib.

Yousef Maher Dawas.

Salam Mema. 

Husam Mubarek. 

Issam Abdallah.

Ahmed Shebab.

Mohamed Fayez Abu Matar.

Saeed al-Taweel.

Mohammed Sobh.

Hisham Alnwajha.

Assad Shamlakh.

Mohammed Al-Salhi.

Mohammad Jarghoun.

Ibrahim Mohammad Lafi.

As Dana Scott cosplayed being under fire, 57 martyrs were laid to rest because they chose death over professional spinelessness. Western journalists had better remember their names. Their blood is on your hands, too.