For years, mainstream media person parroted the connection of their ain governments, and that of lsrael, with small captious sum of oregon situation to the ascendant governmental communicative successful the West. Palestinians person been systematically dehumanized, on with the broader Arab and Muslim world, to service the overseas argumentation objectives of governments without questioning the motivation and ineligible implications. The horrors that person been normalized successful Gaza are the culmination of this agelong past of racism and injustice. But it is not the archetypal clip successful caller representation that the media person played a cardinal relation successful legitimizing warfare crimes.
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It is often said that hindsight is twenty-twenty—a operation that suggests we are amended equipped to justice past events erstwhile their consequences person travel to light. This could not beryllium truer than successful the lawsuit of the 2003 U.S. penetration of Iraq. More than 2 decades aft the incursion that claimed truthful galore Iraqi lives, wrought havoc connected the region, and sowed the seeds of ongoing conflict, determination is present a wide statement among analysts and the American nationalist that the warfare was a catastrophic overseas argumentation mistake. Launched nether the guise of nationalist security, framed arsenic a righteous ngo to escaped the portion of WMDs and to liberate the Iraqi radical from Saddam Hussein—whom the United States had supported arsenic aboriginal arsenic the 195os and successful the 1980s during his warfare of aggression against Iran—the penetration stands contiguous arsenic a textbook lawsuit of however deceit, racism, and empire were packaged for fashionable consumption, with the U.S. media serving arsenic consenting accomplices.
Rather than holding powerfulness to account, media figures and institutions were complicit successful shaping nationalist sentiment to enactment the war.
But portion hindsight whitethorn connection clarity, the warnings were determination from the start. Experts, scholars, and millions of protesters astir the satellite questioned the Bush administration’s propulsion for warfare successful Iraq and the expanding “war connected terror.” They demanded grounds for the WMD claims, called retired anti-Arab and anti-Muslim fearmongering utilized to demonize Iraq, and highlighted the apt humanitarian and geopolitical consequences of launching a preemptive war. These voices, however, were mostly drowned out, portion the loudest platforms were reserved for authorities officials and pundits making a lawsuit for war.
In September 2002, the erstwhile Israeli premier curate Benjamin Netanyahu testified successful beforehand of the U.S. Congress that Saddam Hussein was aggressively processing WMDs, advocated for preemptive U.S. strikes successful Iraq, and made his now-infamous claim, “If you instrumentality retired Saddam, Saddam’s regime, I warrant you that it volition person tremendous affirmative reverberations connected the region.” Just a fewer months later, successful February 2003—a period earlier the invasion—Secretary of State Colin Powell presented a melodramatic lawsuit to the United Nations, citing mobile weapons labs and hidden stockpiles of WMDs arsenic justification for war. Despite interior dissent wrong the quality assemblage and a glaring deficiency of hard evidence, the media did small to situation these claims.
After the penetration was already nether mode successful July 2003, the British premier minister, Tony Blair, continued to importune that determination was “absolutely nary uncertainty astatine each that we volition find grounds of weapons of wide demolition programmes.” Powell’s statements, on with Netanyahu’s and Blair’s, were aboriginal exposed arsenic false, thing Powell himself would admit years later, but the harm had already been done. Iraq was invaded, the lives of mean Iraqis were shattered, and nary weapons were ever found. Nearly 4,500 U.S. troops were killed successful Iraq, arsenic good arsenic 179 British work members, portion hundreds of thousands of Iraqis were killed either straight oregon indirectly arsenic a effect of the war, and millions much were displaced. The warfare unsettled the region, paved the mode for the emergence of ISIS, and triggered a cascade of unit that continues to this day. By immoderate estimates, arsenic noted by the Costs of War task astatine Brown University, up to 4.7 cardinal radical person died successful the post-9/11 warfare zones successful the Middle East, with Iraqis bearing overmuch of that toll. Yet nary 1 was held accountable, not the Bush medication officials who orchestrated the warfare based connected falsehoods, nor the journalists and editors who failed to bash their jobs.
Indeed, alternatively than holding powerfulness to account, media figures and institutions were complicit successful shaping nationalist sentiment to enactment the war. Polling from aboriginal 2003 showed that much than two-thirds of Americans falsely believed Iraq had weapons of wide demolition and a bulk believed Saddam Hussein was straight progressive successful the 9/11 attacks. What explains this spread successful nationalist cognition and the facts connected the ground? These beliefs were not inevitable; they were constructed done repetition, strategical messaging, and, astir important, media sum that echoed the administration’s enactment alternatively than interrogating it.
The relation of the media successful manufacturing consent for warfare is not simply a communicative of journalistic failure; it is grounds of however profoundly the media tin beryllium entrenched successful systems of power. As renowned scholars similar Noam Chomsky and Edward Said person described, the media successful the West person agelong functioned not simply to pass but to reaffirm the legitimacy of empire, particularly erstwhile that empire operates nether the banner of wide democracy. The Iraq War is simply a lawsuit survey successful this phenomenon, wherever the U.S. media presented a communicative of benevolent intervention.
We indispensable besides see what the lack of accountability reveals astir the wellness of democracy. No structural reforms were made, nary editors were dismissed, nor were immoderate anchors held accountable. To the contrary, galore of the precise media figures who pushed for warfare went connected to prestigious roles successful academia, deliberation tanks, and large media outlets. Some of them are present repeating the aforesaid tropes, this clip to support a authorities engaged successful genocide. However, this is not simply a media failure. It is simply a systematic signifier rooted successful imperial powerfulness and a racialized hierarchy of whose suffering matters. Iraqis successful 2003, similar Palestinians today, were not seen arsenic afloat quality beings deserving of life, freedom, oregon justice. They were rendered invisible successful the ascendant discourse, their deaths acceptable costs successful a crippled of powerfulness authorities and conquest.
The sins of 2003 were not simply successful launching a warfare but besides successful however the communicative was told and masked.
In 2004, a twelvemonth aft the invasion, President George W. Bush joked astatine the White House Correspondents’ Association meal astir the nonaccomplishment to find WMDs, quipping, “Those weapons of wide demolition person got to beryllium somewhere.” The assemblage of journalists responded with uproarious laughter for an admittance of warfare crimes being committed based connected the fabrications they disseminated. It was a infinitesimal that captured the grotesque disconnect betwixt the ruling people and the quality outgo of its actions. That infinitesimal besides reflected the normalization of impunity for the powerful, a signifier we present spot repeating itself with horrifying familiarity successful the lawsuit of Gaza.
The parallels betwixt the Iraq penetration and Israel’s battle connected Gaza are striking. In some cases, authorities unit was repackaged arsenic a motivation work and a defence of “Western civilization.” In some cases, the lives of Arabs and Muslims were devalued to the constituent of erasure. In some cases, the media played a captious relation successful shaping nationalist sentiment by framing, by omission, by repetition of authoritative talking points, and by an wide nonaccomplishment to see dissenting voices oregon the perspectives of those astir impacted.
The sins of 2003 were not simply successful launching a warfare but besides successful however the communicative was told and masked. In Gaza, we witnessed the resonance of those mistakes with increasing calls for media accountability arsenic events unfolded and the grounds was live-streamed for everyone to see. The question is whether the media volition ever larn from their mistakes oregon reply for their culpability. In Iraq, the words “shock and awe” described a brutal bombing run that terrorized a civilian population. In Gaza, we perceive presumption similar “precision strikes,” “military targets,” and “human shields” to validate the wholesale demolition of exile camps, hospitals, and full cities. Now, arsenic then, the dehumanization of Arab and Muslim lives is embedded successful the precise connection utilized to picture their slaughter.
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Language and words are not neutral; however we usage them defines our perceptions of planetary affairs and relationships. A communicative is simply a story, and however that communicative is told helps mold nationalist opinion. As such, the narratives constructed by mainstream media outlets are not specified reflections of events but progressive tools of persuasion. Word choices and however stories are framed power the mode radical deliberation astir them, often successful ways that whitethorn look subtle but with an interaction that is rather profound. In the lawsuit of the ongoing unit successful Gaza, the connection deployed by Western media plays a important relation successful guiding the views of their populations, contributing straight to the dehumanization of Palestinians and the perpetuation of pro-Israel biases.
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From Don’t Say Palestine: How the Media Manufactured Consent for Genocide by Assal Rad. Reprinted by support of Vintage Books, an imprint of the Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group, a part of Penguin Random House LLC. Copyright © 2026 by Assal Rad.
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