Israel began bombing Rafah about 4 hours ago and casualties of at least 63 - who knows how many by morning. I just saw ppl shroud a dead baby. @palestine@israel
@Alon@israel@palestine yes - it simply wasn’t posted yet by sources that I trust - of course, naturally one must kill 100+ and bomb a mosque to carry out a rescue in one apartment
@Alon funny … and I’m saying that as someone who regularly reports from Israeli media. Unless you mean #Haaretz or Sikha Mekomit, almost all outlets have been mobilized for hasbara, mostly internal. Outlets like #NYT and #WSJ are friendly enough to cover Israel’s ass in the USA at least.
@oatmeal@Sherifazuhur@israel@palestine Yes, and the reporting in Haaretz has very little to do with what the global pro-Palestine movement says, to the point that there have been fake Haaretz quotes, like a made-up article saying that the hostages who were just rescued had actually been released last year in the ceasefire. Haaretz has had to do a lot of debunking operations.
@Alon most Israeli media simply publishes IDF spox briefs, no questions asked and is non critical. They get lots of free media content from idf media service, which saves them huge amount of money. Not to mention the censorship laws controlling the media and such simplistic anomalies typical of the “only democracy in the Middle East”.
I was looking today at ynet report on the sanctions against the settlers, putting “extreme” in quotations. Or the fact that no Israel outlet picked up the #unrwa interview for Haaretz …
There’s lots of bs floating around but it was the electronic intifada that picked up on Porat’s testimony and the Hannibal Directove, which took months to mention in Israeli media.
And no, Israeli media is a lot more than just publishing what the IDF says. There's a lot of reporting from other sources by people like Barak Ravid, Tal Schneider, etc. It's not always what the IDF wants people to hear.
@Alon activation of the Hannibal directive is “investigated” as you know, after it’s been confirmed what’s happened in be’eri. So they were right about that, not to mention the rest … you’re so sure of yourself that it was “abolished” than that’s a fact, its amusing. Misleading the international media and operating in social media is number one priority of Israel, for a reason.
Not talking about opinion pieces. What people on social media usually share is headlines. The news section of almost all Israeli newspapers after they’ve started slaughtering people in Gaza is printed IDF statements. All of them pass what the IDF says and print photos with captions telling their readers what IDF wants. It’s embarrassing. Everything is a huge success, scores of “terrorists” were killed, even though it’s clear people died. A lot of them. Mostly non combatants.
The total Palestinian death toll in Rafah, which was attributed to the Gaza MoH.
Of note, at no point is there an attempt to debunk Gaza MoH numbers. When the NYTimes reports "Trump says Mexicans are rapists" without a debunking, it's understood that it's amplifying the message. Ditto Israeli media and MoH numbers.
@oatmeal@Sherifazuhur@israel@palestine So no, they're absolutely not saying they killed 67 terrorists. They're saying they killed 67 people in Rafah per the Gaza MoH, and that the IDF says the rescue operation involved killing three Hamas terrorists.
Meanwhile, Tal Schneider is doing reporting on poor field feeding for IDF troops in Gaza. It's a war; in a war, you need military sources, often individual soldiers speaking anonymously. Otherwise, you end up making up offensives and doctrines.
@Alon I think it was Offer Aderet who wrote a piece recently about the state of the Israeli media after the massacre in Gaza started as : copy-paste journalism … reading idf spox announcements not worth reading … it’s exactly my impression. The IDF media devision issued photos are really an embarrassment to anything remotely claiming to be reporting. Non of the Israeli outlets have real access and rely 100% on IDF and those who get embed, like Ron Ben Yishai are really not even worth reading.
@oatmeal@Sherifazuhur@israel@palestine I'm looking through Ofer Aderet's body of work in Haaretz in the war, and most of his headlines are just reports of soldier deaths. When he says other things, they're headlines like "Dutch university cancels a course on the Holocaust due to pro-Palestinian pressure." He did report on Holocaust researchers who say Israel is committing genocide - in the same article pitting them against ones who say Hamas are like the Nazis. He doesn't share your position.
@oatmeal@israel@palestine You're citing a Haaretz reporter who is reporting on global pro-Palestinian anti-Semitism as some crutch with which to say Israeli media speaks with one voice re the IDF.
(Separately, I don't recall ever having read anything by Ben Yishai this conflict. The mainstream journos I read are Barak Ravid, Noga Tarnopolsky, Nadav Eyal, and Tal Schneider, plus some Mekomit writers like John Brown, who at this point is blaming most things on religious people.)
@oatmeal@israel@palestine (I also look at OSINT, but most of the OSINT that I trust, like Bellingcat and OSINT Technical, focus mainly on Ukraine - the only things I recall by them re the IDF this conflict are a) confirming the IDF was right re Al-Ahli and b) pointing out the IDF was making up a photo in its "we're totes distributing food to Gazans" packet. IDF comms are generally reliable on military matters like "we attacked here" and generally Pravda on human rights matters.)
@Alon here’s another example of N12 publishing IDF spox brief about “violent protest” of peace activists that turned out to be a lie and they took idf spox to court.
ב-N12 דיווח ניר דבורי - כעובדה - את עמדת דובר צה"ל כי "החיילים ביקשו פעם אחר פעם לזוז, אך פעילי השמאל סירבו. בצבא אמרו גם ש"כך גם החלו התגרויות ופרובוקציות. החיילים השתמשו ברימוני הלם וגז בניסיון לפזר את המפגינים".
This is before the war, so obviously in war thing are far worse, because of media self censorship.
Look at ynet. How would ynet know what happened in attacks in Gaza they’re reporting about every 5 mins with tones of photos and glorifying details? Do they have their journalists there? Of course not. None of the Israeli newspapers do. Ynet simply prints what IDF gives it as news, while anything coming from foreign media they qualify. Ie the put “extreme” settlers in quotes when transcribing Reuters or AP updates.
@oatmeal What you're missing is that there are tons of journalists in Gaza. The conflict is extremely well-covered; James Palmer on Bluesky points out that AP has more journalists in Gaza than in China. The IDF can't hide operations. It's not possible that it is currently launching a ground op in Rafah along the lines of Khan Younis and Gaza City. Ditto IDF dead, which matters since Hamas comms insist that they killed 1,600 Israeli soldiers not counting 7.10, which, lol.
@oatmeal Media criticism in the entire period since the hostage rescue has been a bunch of coping by people who thought there was a major ground op in Rafah, were wrong while Israeli journos analyzing Bibi's statements in advance were right (I forgot to mention Anshel Pfeffer among the ones I read), and are turning 67 dead in Rafah in a war that's averaging 150 dead Gazans a day into a bigger deal than it is.
@Alon embedded with IDF. that’s not journalism. AFAIK journalists can’t enter Gaza unescorted and Egypt will not allow them either.
Apropos Ron Ben Yishay he himself wrote about y Yom Kipur about being blocked by IDF spox from reporting about sophisticated weapon the Egyptian gained, claiming it’ll damage fighters’ morale. The consequence was the high number of casualties in that war.
So claiming people should take IDF spox seriously is, especially now, when the IDF is tuned tor disinformation that will give israel the legitimacy to continue the massacre undisturbed, is really not serious.
@oatmeal No, not just embedded with the IDF - independent or embedded with Hamas.
And the gap between Israel not reporting on Egyptian weapons in 1973 and Israel reporting soldier deaths now, when reporters are constantly slagging on the IDF for its failure on 7.10, is vast.
And that's besides the part where OSINT confirmed the IDF knee-jerk line on Al-Ahli, more or less (the IDF technically said an Islamic Jihad rocket hit the hospital when in fact it hit the parking lot and started a fire).
@oatmeal@palestine@Alon@israel و لو؟
Why would I agree with Ofer Aderet?
My former student, Zvi Barel also writes for them and I never agree with his political analyses -
to be fair, I'm not sure if it was Aderet [can't find my notes who was it], but there's plenty to go by. Very similar claims made in a report by Idan Ring and Shuki Tausig recently.
I'll say it again, some outlets like Ynet, Maariv, Mako (not ot mention right-wing JPost, Israel Today etc.) are mostly copy and paste of IDF spox statments when it comes to news reporting. Of course, there's also lots of other type of content which doens't necesearly fall into this category, but going by healdines, its what IDF wants that shapes the headlines.
One big caveat: all of this outlets can be very critical of Netanyhu and his goverment, and still "patriotic" to the point of propaganda.
-------------------- trans -------
Since the terrible tragedy of the massacre in the Gaza periphery and the subsequent invasion of Gaza, the IDF Spokesperson's Unit and its head have been prominent in their high functioning. IDF Spokesperson Daniel Hagari appears before the media every evening and presents a comprehensive and fluent situation assessment, answers questions, and instills confidence in the citizens. Soldiers of the unit and its emissaries accompany the forces on the front in the Gaza Strip, comprehensively documenting the invasion and its consequences, and disseminating explanatory content that reinforces the fighting spirit and the citizens' belief in the IDF.
The Israeli news broadcasts and websites rush to submit to the military spokesperson and echo the statements and documentation of the invasion's successes, the heroism of the fighters, and the humane and moral treatment of Gaza's civilians by the IDF. The Israeli viewers at home, stunned and grieved by the massacre in the Gaza periphery and the incessant attack on the home front, are comforted and encouraged by images and videos of the fighting soldiers and the intensive strikes in the Strip.
The IDF Spokesperson does his job: to speak for the IDF. The problem begins when Israeli journalists get confused and think that this is their job too. The truth is, of course, that the role of the media is the opposite. Journalists are not spokespersons, they are, well, journalists. For a spokesperson, the supreme and sole interest is that of the client. For a journalist, the supreme and sole interest is that of the public.
[....] This, of course, is a mistake. As Israeli history has proven time and time again, in the most painfully possible way. This confusion [between patriotism and truth] is what allows the "false conceptions" that explode in our faces every time. The truth is that loyalty to the truth is the ultimate patriotism.
But when it comes to the IDF, and especially in times of war, the fog of war also covers this sound logic. Criticism of the IDF, or even just truthful reporting on the reality of war, is seen as unpatriotic and draws a barrage of curses and insults on social networks. The direct loser is the Israeli public, which is spared the full picture of the war, but the damage done is also to the war effort itself.
@oatmeal@Sherifazuhur@palestine@israel "Criticism of the IDF is seen as unpatriotic" - Bibi does it all the time, and yeah, people are pissed, but those arguments get aired extensively.
@Alon sigh… you know that’s not what we’re talking about. The issue is media’s constructive criticism. As in when journalist do their job as god intended. #Nethanyhu, like Trump, simply passes the buck and attacks people he can blame for his own failures.
@oatmeal@Sherifazuhur@palestine@israel No, it means journalists absolutely write things the IDF doesn't want printed, given to them by a variety of sources - some by Bibi, some by individual soldiers, some by civilians in the Gaza Envelope (the coverage immediately after 7.10 was "where the fuck was the IDF in the Gaza Envelope when it was being raided?").
@israel@Alon@palestine And same goes for the US - especially after working with the Army and DOD, I trust no official statement unless I have 2-3 other sources. Look how confusing Centcom’s statements have been lately.
@israel@Alon@palestine The opposite. From Day 2 when I had to appear on BBC and ISR IDF spokesman was on, I’ve heard nothing but lies, deflections and twists - this idea that a rescue requires massive bombardments as a “distraction” is a good example
@Alon The question is whether ANY of these people are actually Hostages at all, and not, technically under international law, Immigration Law Prisoners. After all they were in OCCUPIED #PALESTINIANS Territory without Visa OR Permission. In the US you'd be a PRISONER of US IMMIGRATION AND CUSTOMS, and if it's good for that 'gander', it's good for their CLIENT STATE Goose too, @Sherifazuhur@israel@palestine
@Alon@Sherifazuhur@israel@palestine indeed if the IDF is announcing something that cannot be faked and would be extremely detrimental to them among their own admirers if found untrue, they have more credibility.
the how and why part, of course, could still be false.
@matunos@palestine@Alon@israel I’m sorry - I’ve seen mountains of false evidence and it has not abated since 7 Oct. General rule: do not turn to US PAO, or the Egyptian army spokesman or the Shin Bet account for anything but the current official statement which is ephemeral (will change by tomorrow) but part of the info war. All the lies or half lies on tunnels have a purpose - to justify flattening arial bombardment & ground invasions to then “clean out” tunnels. Negotiating would be far preferable.
It's always good advice to consider the motivations and biases of any report, and especially so when it's coming from one of the parties of a conflict.
@matunos@Sherifazuhur@israel@palestine Yeah, which is why it's important to have enough media literacy to know what the IDF can and can't lie about. It can't make up military operations that don't exist, or deny ones that do exist - it can only deceive about their nature (hence the bombings in Rafah that were thought to be a prelude to a full ground invasion and turned out to be cover for the rescue). It can't lie about its own casualties at scale - Israelis would find out, this isn't Russia.
See how quickly everyone forgot about the massive depopulation of Ukraine? It is still ongoing. But focus is now on Gaza while billions continue to get laundered from US to Ukraine.
The enmity between Washington and Kremlin is kabuki theater. The incompetence of the Biden regime is theater. Biden and friends in Washington are fully competent megalomaniacs and grifters playing mind games with the idiocratic electorate.
The regime wants us to think Biden administration is incompetent. They are actors putting on a deliberate show of incompetence. If Joe was so fragile that he was really falling down the stairs they would never let him near stairs without an aid. If he really was senile and mentally incapable with such memory problems he would have been article 25'd a long time ago. Such nincompoop and oopsie moments are planned for the cameras.
The genocide in Gaza was planned already when the Ukraine conflict was planned. They did the same type of joint planning during the two world wars to exterminate tens of millions Germans, Franks, and Poles in the heart of Europe. This was done to establish and strengthen the Soviet Union so Wall Street could invest without consequences. It is also done to kill off the Alpha males in all involved countries who jump to the front of the line to 'fight the enemy'. This weakens and thins the populations of all countries involved to keep the ruling class in control.
@matunos The Israeli military and government have each made so many excruciatingly shameful false claims in the last four months (and over many years). Their supporters generally either never hear about the debunking, reject all evidence that conflicts with their commitments, or don't care and openly embrace authoritarian doublethink (cf MAGA). Putin, Trump, Netanyahu, Modhi and other recent authoritarian strongmen (Bolsonaro, Orbán, Erdoğan, etc) have discovered just how effective the firehose of disinformation is in an age of mass fake media, divided electorates, microtargeted disinformation and late capitalist ecocidal societal crumbling.
At this point, I think the "embarrassment" epistemological criterion has to be retired. Such figures has realised that shameless repetition of lies, and repetition of more lies when those lies are exposed, and never giving an inch, nets you a support base with basically indestructible support, so long as you never show any sign of weakness in the façade of endless bullshit.
@matunos@Sherifazuhur@israel@palestine No, it's more than this. The IDF's reports of the basic military matters - where the troops are operating, IDF casualties, etc. - have been reliable. Israel isn't Russia, it can't hide massive numbers of bodies of its own troops.
(Relatedly: hasbara was shit on and right after 7.10 - nobody knew what to do, and the state's best idea was to buy likes on Twitter; the #HamasIsISIS campaign was freelance. But in the war itself, it's functioning just fine.)
@Alon@Sherifazuhur@israel@palestine right, these also seem like factual claims that are hard to keep a lie about going. versus, say, what they found in an underground bunker or a teen's bedroom
@matunos@Sherifazuhur@israel@palestine The bedroom paraphernalia is pretty lolzy, yeah. But the tunnels have video evidence, and that includes the data center under the UNRWA HQ (note that Lazzarini didn't even bother denying, saying "we didn't know" with zero contrition).
@Alon@Sherifazuhur@israel@palestine I'm not saying they're all false, I'm saying they don't have a lot of credibility. Where things are independently corroborated or at least seem difficult to fake, then that must be factored in.
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