Why is the media so one-sided when it comes to Israel / Palestine?

Question

I'm just curious why it’s always one-sided. What I've noticed is that the news, papers, etc. keep showing the Palestinians as terrorists and Israelis as victims. Whereas many documentaries I've watched show Palestinians as the victims and the Israelis as selfish and refusing to share the land with the Palestinians.

I know that both sides have the victims and the aggressors, but why do they always show only one side? It makes people ignorant to the whole situation. For example, I'm sure those who watch the news will simply think "poor Israelis, being attacked by the Palestinians all the time", and those that watch the documentaries will say "poor Palestinians, always being attacked by the Israelis".

Just in case it does, I don't want to cause any controversy with this question. So I apologise in advance if it does.

Answer 1

yea... CNN, al-Jazeera and BBC are on Pals side whilst i think FOX , NBC are on Israel's side.

i know both sides are victims too but the f/////g media doesn't know.

Answer 2

Hi Goldie,

The reason you see the stories Muslims are describing only on YouTube and unrecognizable news media is because those stories are all invented by Muslims in order to get sympathy from people like you.  This is the Pallywood propaganda machine hard at work against Israel .

The reason you see actual occurrences in Israel reported by recognizable news media is because they are true. We have no need to fabricate stories to have them reported.  On the other hand Muslims fabricate stories in order to be seen as victims, and because their stories are fabricated, they will never be shown to the real world.

Sincerely,

Ms. Miche ; })

Answer 3

do u know y, bcoz the matter of israel and palestine everyone know about it. they know the medecin but they try to give it deferent one so that the solution wont be found. try to make people understand , special the new generation that palestinians are bad . u get.if they really say truth about israel and palestine , the solution would be found the same day, but they are playing hide and seek game.

i can assure you that coz of what is sometime said on tv or heard on radio those who are not aware of the situation  i mean from the begining or never go to school , they know oposite of what the reality is over there.

u get . that s the main point . try to make it like it hapened other way.

Answer 4

because of money !

Answer 5

I know what you mean, Goldie. Even then, I think the media in Britain is more awake to the conflict. Most Americans don't have a clue what their government is doing in their name - documentaries like this wouldn't exist otherwise: http://www.moviesfoundonline.com/occupat...

(Occupation101 has won numerous awards)

I think however, things are changing. Israel wont be able to propagate these myths much longer as the world wakes up to what they're doing.

I am neither Jewish or Muslim. There isn't a finite amount of happiness in the world - there is enough for everyone. EDIT: Ms. Miche, I suggest you open your eyes to reality, no matter where your affections lay.

Answer 6

who knows the entire media seems like its owned  by the Zionists now a days!

Answer 7

Palestinian organizations have little funds for propaganda,whereas jewish organizations throughout the world spend lavishly on top-flight public relations firm who flood the media with feature articles propounding everything from their point of view. it's a question of money.

Answer 8

I think you inverted it.

Answer 9

The Jews have control over the media, but with the Internet that won't last long. Look how time changes.

I am sure you are talking about the documentary Occupation 101.

Answer 10

well I guess cause they're with one side and they hate the other side.I don't want to give you my opinion on who's the terrorist here even though I feel like doing it really badly but my teacher and i once talked about it and she told me even if they were equal in their writing, when they hand it in somebody would change it and make it bias again.All we can do is pray for the best and hope not much/not at all people get killed.

Answer 11

The Israeli settlers first came from Europe. Its a race thing.

Shimon Perez was a Sephardic Jew and he got whacked.

Answer 12

Perhaps because Palestine's ELECTED officials are run by Hamas, a worldy recognized TERRORIST group.

EDIT:

Israel's main objective is not to attack civilian Palestinians. Unfortunately that is a casualty of war. However, Hamas doesn't give a s**t and will attack civilians.

Answer 13

because the zionists control the media.  It is part of their war tactics to try to get the sympathy of foreign countries and people.  It worked for a long time but no one believes them now, and it is all going against them.

Answer 14

i agree that the media is one sided, But you have it wrong, the media is mostly anti israel and pro palestinians.It will come as no surprise to learn that journalists in the Middle East share an interest in sensationalism with their colleagues covering domestic issues. The most egregious examples come from television reporters whose emphasis on visuals over substance encourages facile treatment of the issues. For example, when NBC's correspondent in Israel was asked why reporters turned up at Palestinian demonstrations in the West Bank they knew were being staged, he said, “We play along because we need the pictures.”10 The networks can't get newsworthy pictures from closed societies such as Syria, Saudi Arabia, Iran or Libya.

Israel often faces an impossible situation of trying to counter images with words. "When a tank goes into Ramallah, it does not look good on TV," explains Gideon Meir of the Israeli Foreign Ministry. "Sure we can explain why we are there, and that's what we do. But it's words. We have to fight pictures with words."

The magnitude of the problem Israel confronts is clear from Tami Allen-Frost, deputy chairman of the Foreign Press Association and a producer for Britain's ITN news, who says "the strongest picture that stays in the mind is of a tank in a city" and that "there are more incidents all together in the West Bank than there are suicide bombings. In the end, it's quantity that stays with you."

“We were filming the beginning of the demonstration. Suddenly, a van pulled in hurriedly. Inside, there were Fatah militants. They gave their orders and even distributed Molotov cocktails. We were filming. But these images, you will never see. In a few seconds, all those youngsters surrounded us, threatened us, and then took us away to the police station. There, we identified ourselves but we were compelled to delete the controversial pictures. The Palestinian Police calmed the situation but censored our pictures. We now have the proof that those riots are no longer spontaneous. All the orders came from the Palestinian hierarchy.”

— Jean Pierre Martin

Answer 15

I see one sided in the other direction, against Israel.

Fairness in reporting should be that reporting is accurate.

Hamas is a terrorist group:  Hamas is listed as a terrorist organization by Canada,[8] Israel,[9] Japan,[10] and the United States,[11] and is banned in Jordan.[12] Australia[13] and the United Kingdom[14] list only the military wing of Hamas, the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades, as a terrorist organization. The European Union[15] lists Hamas as a group 'involved in terrorist attacks' and has implemented restrictive measures against Hamas. Hamas.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hamas

Current fairness in reporting:  

/start sarcasm

Yes, they train children to suicide bomb, but they make hospitals to care for their sick ones.

Oh, they want Israel's destruction but they need sympathy because they are a people without a pre-determined country!

/end sarcasm

Is that what kind of fairness in reporting we want to see?  Or some people only want to see the "good things" and believe fuzzy bunny stories?

Here's a wonderful "fuzzy bunny story" compliments of Hamas TV.  http://www.memritv.org/clip/en/1679.htm

FFS if they act like radical terrorists they should be labeled and reported as such.

I find it interesting that Jordan put Hamas on their list of "banned" people I didn't know that til I just looked at the wiki link. I knew that Jordan kicked out the radical PLO extremists along time ago.

Black September in Jordan was a significant factor in how these paletinians got to be kicked out of Jordan and are at Israel's doorstep today. Jordan has a massive palestinian population and is also a state in the region formerly known as Palestine, now known as Israel and Jordan.

The palestinians actually do have a country to live in their own native region.  But Jordan doesn't want radicals in their country.  Poor Israel that everyone left this problem for her to deal with.

These factors you wont see on CNN, or by watching a brief documentary produced by who knows who with who knows what political agenda. They have oil money to produce whatever propaganda they want. And it is a bit more complicated than a 5 minute Western news clip. One actually has to "study up" and not believe all the propaganda put forth by those extremist terrorists.

And I thoroughly disagree with that statement that both sides are victims and aggressors.  Israel has been defending against aggression for a very long time now.  Do not confuse self defense with aggression.

http://www.terrorismawareness.org/what-r...

Answer 16

Good question goldie,as a news junkie i would disagree with your asessment of the bias Ive never seen the media condemning Arafat<yes i know hes dead,Fatah, only once have i seen them condemn Hamas, but when an Israeli child is killed nothing,when Israel attacks the militants to defend its citizens and unfortunately a child is killed because the terrorists hide amongst innocent civilians, its international news.

Answer 17

Because we send the wrong people to the USA to represent us for the last 50 years. We have Palestinian official representation in NY from the late 1950s.

All we cared about is who is going to be loyal to our  leaders back home. The GUPS did in few years what the officials did in 50 years with few information tables in the Americans Universities.

The American students did not know Palestine from Pakistan back then.

Answer 18

it is because Palestinians who make the news ARE terrorists and the Israels are not. it is simple

Answer 19

It sounds as though you've heard both sides through the media.  I have, as well.  Why do you think it's one-sided?  I have seen documentary films that do not portray Israelis in negative ways and television and print news that do.  I read BBC news and find it to be pro-Palestinian.

There are hundreds of TV channels from all over the world, websites of every variety, newspapers with every possible opinion - you get to sort out the truth yourself, as do the rest of us.  It sounds as though, like me, you like to get your information from multiple sources.

Or like you are trolling for anti-Semites to say, "The Jews control the media".  Predictably, you got a  couple. I apologize in advance if that is not the case.

Regardless of intent, though, my personal opinion is that the average U.S. news show or newspaper or citizen is too mindlessly evenhanded in their thoughts about the conflict.  The stories are usually about how both sides are responsible for the cycle of violence.  They're usually about how the U.S. wants a two-state solution and how neither side is cooperating.  They lay equal blame when probably the blame is not so equal.  I do not see what you do.  Just this morning I read a story about the broken cease-fire that blamed both sides for breaking it.  Personally, I do not think they were right in equating Palestinians shooting civilian hikers or lobbing rockets into civilian areas with Israelis killing a military commander who'd attacked Israel, but they were right that both sides broke the cease-fire and blamed each other.

Answer 20

Had your vision checked recently?  Perhaps your reasoning skills also.

When you see Israeli's they are usually in uniform.  That's because the media portrays them as war mongers.  Never showing the common man trying to live a life of freedom and peace.

When they show the Arabs they are always in rags and no men around.  Like Gaza and the PA aren't run by corrupt thieves.

where are the pictures of the Hamas Army or the stockpiles of weapons and ammo the stole from the US when they ran the PLO out.

They show construction workers on disputed sights, but never the homemade rockets lying under the beds of these poor down trodden peoples.

The main CNN reporter in Israel claims to travel back and forth from Jerusalem into Gaza, yet he never has any pics of the rocketeers and their Iranian missiles.

yes the media is very biased.  They love an underdog that sells news and will protect that income at all costs.

God forbid Israel is attacked from all sides.  If so we would be seeing the poor suffering Jews and the n**i Muslims.

Whatever sells.

The truth has nothing to do with it.

Answer 21

It depends on the media you chose to refer to.  It's for this reason I try to look at different sources of information, to get all possible sides of the story.  There are plenty of non-mainstream news sources out there, you just have to look for them.  Here's one great link to a website that pulls articles from various sources with interesting perspectives.

http://www.guerrillanews.com/

When you read a story, you'll also see a link for its source somewhere on the page.  They also have great videos you can watch some times as well.

Anyway, its not the media itself that is biased, but the institutions that make up the media.  Look at the opposing views and make your own decisions.

Cheers.

Answer 22

I really don't believe they are,you get different views from different sources. The media reports in a way to get more readers or viewers,so they sometimes try to raise the shock factor. People just tend to see what they already perceive about any situation,sometimes emotions play a role in our perception. It is the same for any situation really.

Answer 23

Because the Palestinians have FACTS my dear Goldie!

Because the Jews are doing some real nasty things against those people that happened to be living on that land for thousands of years before the Jews decided to claim the deed from God ...Himself!

Do you really believe what you are saying?

Amazing!

Answer 24

that's weird. all i can see is that the media shows Israel as "one big bully" and the Palestinians as the victims.they never tell the truth, that's why people who don't live here have no idea!