When more than a thousand Hamas terrorists invaded Israeli territory on October 7 to perpetrate a bloody massacre of unarmed Israeli civilians, it was preceded by the proscribed terrorist organization firing a salvo of rockets from across the Gaza border.
Since then, the rockets have not stopped. Every day over the past three weeks, hundreds of rockets have been shot at Israeli towns and cities, forcing tens of thousands of Israelis to take cover in shelters and safe rooms.
Israel’s missile-based defensive system known as the Iron Dome is under pressure. Each Iron Dome battery contains three or four launchers that are equipped with 20 interceptor missiles, which stop rockets that are heading toward populated areas. But a heavy barrage can overwhelm it.
At least 11 Israelis have died as a result of rocket strikes, countless more civilians have been injured, and damage has been recorded in nearly every major Israeli civilian center.
Not that you would know any of this by reading the international news media.
Despite the consistency and ferocity of the Hamas rocket attacks, outlets such as the BBC, The Guardian, The Washington Post, and CNN have repeatedly failed to mention them in recent live coverage of the Israel-Hamas war.
And the coverage has been extensive.
The Guardian, for example, maintains a news page about the war consisting of breaking news updates 24 hours a day.
Yet, when Hamas launched numerous large missile barrages toward Israel between October 27-29, injuring numerous people and destroying homes and buildings in Tel Aviv, Holon, Rishon Lezion, Ramat Gan, Beersheba, Ashkelon and Kiryat Ono, the outlet failed to mention the attacks once (see here, here and here).
This is despite the fact that over the 72-hour period, The Guardian managed to find time to cover every other development in the war, including detailed reports on Israeli airstrikes, the humanitarian situation in Gaza, and the view of US-based civil rights groups of the conflict.
Likewise, the Washington Post published more than a dozen pieces about the conflict during the same time frame. They included articles about Israeli forces entering Gaza City, the movement of aid shipments into the Strip, and the United States administration’s reaction to Israel’s aerial assaults.
However, just two pieces — copy taken entirely from the Associated Press wire agency — made any passing reference to the ongoing rocket strikes and neglected to mention the many injured Israelis or the extensive damage caused.
Isn’t it amazing that @UNRWA‘s commissioner-general seems to be under the impression that Hamas isn’t stockpiling fuel?
What are they firing rockets with? Willpower? pic.twitter.com/rL91T5rSvC
— HonestReporting (@HonestReporting) October 28, 2023
In addition to providing rolling broadcast coverage every evening of the war, the BBC also publishes breaking news updates about the conflict.
The British broadcaster’s reporting on the rocket strikes fell woefully short, including omitting them from several articles or briefly referencing vague “barrages of rockets” while quoting Hamas officials.
In the past few hours, millions of Israelis, including residents of Jerusalem & Tel Aviv, have been forced to take cover in shelters or safe rooms as Hamas fires barrages of rockets.
And the details from @BBCNews live newsfeed online?
Absolutely nothing. pic.twitter.com/JMCyTN73tj
— HonestReporting (@HonestReporting) October 16, 2023
The media’s inattention to the constant rocket fire is important for two reasons.
First, it represents the abject failure of mainstream news organizations to accurately report what is going on in the region — it is effectively lying by omission.
Second, and most importantly, it perpetuates a dangerous and skewed picture of the Israel-Hamas conflict.
Media outlets have reported in minute detail every development of Israel’s counterattack against Hamas, from the movement of ground troops into the Strip and the continuing airstrikes to the humanitarian issues affecting the enclave.
The narrative is one of a purely one-sided assault on a defenseless territory packed with suffering civilians, which is a clear departure from the truth that Hamas rocket strikes have not stopped since its initial attack.
Consider CNN’s coverage over 24 hours in which the sirens that blared across cities in Israel and subsequent hits were reported. While CNN failed to report this at all in 17,500 words of coverage in its live updates piece, it referenced Israeli airstrikes on Gaza no fewer than 28 times.
The above is merely a snapshot of one way in which the international media distorts the Israel-Hamas war.
It makes sense that greater media coverage is afforded to Israeli strikes given the intensity of the counterattack, but this should not come at the expense of reporting the ongoing and relentless attacks by Hamas against Israeli citizens.
This is, after all, the very essence of journalism: to report the full, unvarnished facts.
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Photo credit: JACK GUEZ/AFP via Getty Images
