The coursework I’m submitting for this course is the assignment that required us to examine the media coverage of refugees or IDPs in the Arab region and the prompt was as follows:
Go through media coverage once again and choose 3 articles pertaining to the refugees or IDPs in the Arab region. This time, choose one angle on the issue (e.g. Covid, natural disaster, political strife) OR one host country to focus on (Jordan, Lebanon, Yemen etc.), OR one refugee group (Syrians, Palestinians, Somalis etc.). Outline who are the audiences? What is included as part of the material? What is the prominent voice or position across the articles?
Over the years the media coverage for IDPs and refugees increased as the wars kept increasing in the states that are currently suffering, but increased media coverage didn’t necessarily mean good media coverage either. More often than not media coverage is either incredibly biased or just simply ignorant and derogatory towards the refugees and IDPs who are in a state of war and losing lives every day. It’s specifically very interesting to look at how major new channels and media outlets, especially those based in the US end up writing and presenting these stories which lack so much depth and reality at the end of the day.
The first article to look at is the one by the United Nations news page which writes articles about ongoing conflicts and here they write about the Palestine-Israel conflict that has been going on for years now. The article is titled “Israel-Palestine: Risk of ‘deadly escalation’ in violence, without decisive action”, and you can pinpoint the issue right away that the title itself shows such a huge amount of ignorance towards the Palestinian people. He audience should be the entire global population but seems to be pleasing the west more so than considering the emotions and sentiments of the people in the Middle East. It highlights “violence” escalating in both countries when the ethnic cleansing of the Palestinian people has been going at the hands of Israel and simultaneously taking lives of the Palestinian civilians for their own gains. The United Nations tries to act neutral and stay that way for the sake of having Israel and the US on their side at the cost of overlooking the deaths of millions of innocent lives. As you read further down in this article, the writer mentions the death toll of the Palestinian people in the past month following it up with the death toll in Israel, disregarding that for the Palestinian people it is a matter of self-defense that came many years later and is barely a fight for Israel that has armed forces in bulk which is so much more in comparison to what Palestine has just to protect themselves from the violence they have been facing. All throughout the article you can see that the United Nations tries extremely hard not to take anyone’s side even if it has been obvious who is the suffering and who the perpetrator. They even go to the lengths of reporting that “apparently” Israeli authorities have made advanced plans for housing units to offer them to Palestinians when it is clear from how they have incorporated immense violence and brutal force against Palestinians even in the past one year. The United Nations tries hard to keep things neutral yet glorify Israel’s position in the issue and rarely even ever talk about the violence the Palestinian people have to face on a daily basis.
The second article we are taking a look at is by the New York Times and is titled “Conflict Spirals Across Israel and the Palestinian Territories”, in which yet again we see Israel’s show of open violence and brutality countered and justified with Hamas attacks even though that comes from a place of self-defense and being under constant attack. The article mentions that two entire media outlets were destroyed and bombed by Israel when supposed “peace talks” were taking place and the very next sentence is stated as the Hamas militants firing rocket barrages at Tel Aviv as though the attacks are of any comparison in magnitude of level of destruction. The loss of Palestine is always minimized and overshadowed by what few attacks Hamas militants counter attack at Israel, which is never an answer to violence but the way of it being represented is the root of the problem. Reporting attacks is not the main problem of these news articles but how the attacks Israel initiates are justified by Hamas attacks which are never of any comparison in any form of measurement. As the death toll of the Palestinians in Gaza is mentioned in the article, it is followed by a “but” in the next sentence and mentioned as the “civil unrest” in Israel and “mob attacks”, which is somehow compared to the killing of hundreds of Palestinians. Apart from being sincerely ignorant towards the lives lost, it is somehow compared to a much smaller violent activities taking place in Israel without any regard for innocent lives being lost. Often reading such articles can genuinely highlight the audience the media outlets are trying to please and be on the good side of and that is more often than not the United States.
Finally, in the third article titled “Violence between Israelis and Palestinians escalates toward allout war” by the Washington Post highlights a completely new issue that we didn’t see in the previous articles, testimony and perspective of an Israeli and sympathy for them and not much coverage for those under attack on the other side in Gaza. The article tries to remain neutral much like the previous two articles explicitly want to remain neutral and diplomatic although implicitly want to please people in the United States, hence don’t report much about the torture the people of Gaza have faced for years. Hear in this article we are able to continue much of the same kind of writing since all of these western media outlets mirror each other in a way, but here we come across a part focused solely for the Israeli people under attack by Hamas. Hamas, although they do carry violent rocket attacks, have always been recognized and used as a way of reducing and throwing away any sympathy for the people in Gaza and to simply villainize them. We see an Israeli army spokesperson highlight that they only want to strike the “military targets” and if any lives of children were lost then Hamas was to simply be blamed for hiding weaponry in areas where civilians live. Such statements are gladly recorded and presented on such global western media outlets that share sympathy with a state carrying genocide and printing out their excuses for the massacre taking place initiated by them, creating false narratives. To create contrast, a case study of a civilian was taken who lives in Israel and was killed, adding a more sympathetic outlook towards the Israelis and to paint the this picture of Palestinians as the brutal and ruthless killers who are hungry for the blood of poor civilians in Israel when it is more often the other way around and has been for many years. The statements taken from these people are full of sadness and grieve to spark an emotion and sway their audience which is usually already on the side of the Israelis since it is targeted more so at the local Americans who read this to gain actual news, rather than the people in the east who are aware of its bias and wrongful ways of reporting journalism.
In conclusion, a much better way of reporting stories of refugees is not hide facts and figures and if two sides need to be represented then both sides should be given the same amount of opportunities. If there is a spokesperson who represents one side of the conflict, then there should be a spokesperson in touch with on the other side too, in order to make sure that there is fair journalism taking place. More refugees and IDPs, need to be contacted and represented in these articles, their struggles, their daily lives and the truth about the violence they have been facing and their losses too. There needs to be better representation of these refugees that has been taken advantage of and ruined through years and years of biased and unjust journalism in the west.
Refrences
Nations, United. (2021, November 30). Israel-palestine: Risk of 'Deadly escalation' in violence, without decisive action | | UN news. United Nations. Retrieved February 22, 2022, from https://news.un.org/en/story/2021/11/1106832
Kingsley, P., & Yee, V. (2021, May 15). Conflict spirals across Israel and the Palestinian Territories. The New York Times. Retrieved February 22, 2022, from https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/15/world/middleeast/israel-palestinian-conflictgaza.html
Hendrix, S., & Rubin, S. (2021, May 12). Violence between Israelis and Palestinians escalates toward all-out war. The Washington Post. Retrieved February 22, 2022, from https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/israel-palestinian-fightingworsens/2021/05/11/a1886c9a-b1c6-11eb-bc96-fdf55de43bef_story.html