Assal Rad – Don't Say Palestine – Comment.

It should be known to many now that legacy media is not a reliable source for accurate reporting.  More so, mainstream outlets are acting as a tool for powerful institutions and governments, pushing their particular agendas. Though in the west, many brag about the "freedom of the press" as a major component of democratic values, it has become an apparatus of censorship to mold public opinion for the powerful. In Rad's important book, Don't say Palestine - How the Media Manufactured Consent for Genocide, drills down on the media's reporting on the Gaza genocide, citing numerous examples that add up to nothing less than journalistic malpractice. 

This becomes more than evident when we read and see media and politicians clearly practicing hypocrisy and double standards. We certainly witnessed this during the Biden administration, where Putin's Ukraine war is categorized as a war crime, and Israeli crimes in Gaza are ignored or couched in euphemistic language. Putin illegally annexes Ukraine while Israel "shifts its borders." The western press condemns Putin's war in Ukraine, yet they're complicit in not holding Israel accountable in any form. 

Mainstream media is acting in defense of power. Rad states her thesis: "My central critique is focused on legacy media and the structures of power that create guidelines on what can be said." The New York Times is particularly guilty linguistically excusing or downplaying Israeli war crimes. 

A fair example was the murder of the aid workers on March 29, 2025. Israel at first denied the entire incident. Later it was found that the IDF buried the bodies including the emergency vehicles. The original Times headline read: 

Israel says its Account of Rescue Workers killed in Gaza was Partly a Mistake.

Rad corrects the headline: 

Israel Lied about Rescue Workers Killed in Gaza. 

What mainstream media has done is shielded Israeli crimes from the headlines, avoiding any language that might make Israel appear guilty. 

One of the most appalling crimes committed by Israeli forces is the killing of 274 journalists and media workers since October 2023. The number of Palestinian journalists stands around 269. An Associated Press headline read:

A Rough Year for Journalists in 2025, with a little hope for things to turn around.

Rad corrects the headline:

Israel Leading Killer of Journalists in 2025.

In the dozens of examples that Rad provides, apart from those that are simply misleading, ISRAEL is never mentioned once. This is intentional to remove Israel from the crime. This is a form of whitewashing and censorship that is unprecedented. 

Rad writes:

"...the media that laundered these offenses, framed the genocide in the language of accusation, and refused to name the criminal and the crime created the space for doubt and, consequently, sanctioned genocidal denial. When the storytellers obfuscate the facts to rationalize these crimes, they become culpable in them. When they tell a false story, that is not a free press. It is genocide propaganda."  (P.200) (Emphasis, my own.) 

This is an important book for it exposes the news organizations and "journalists" that use a strategic linguistic formula, to deny the realities of the most watched genocide in modern history. There should be a reckoning for these news outlets in their complicity in the intended ethnic cleansing of the Palestinian people. Unfortunately, however, as we saw after the Iraq war, these pundits and politicians that pushed the war and blatantly lied, went on to greater status within their organizations.  

There will be no accountability. 

This is an excellent text on journalistic failure, the defense of power, and how the tools of power operate.