The suppression of guilt: the Israeli media and the reoccupation of the West Bank

Is Israeli society losing touch with the rest of the world -- and with the reality of the on-going conflict with the Palestinians in the course of the Intifada? Israeli scholar Daniel Dor measures the breach between Israel's collective consciousness and international public opinion, and concludes that Israeli society has dangerously withdrawn into a sense of isolation and victimization -- in very large part because of the role played by the Israeli media during the reoccupation. Dor examines the ways in which the major Israeli media not only reported on events (or failed to do so) but played a key part in shaping opinion, setting the agenda and waging the propaganda war that accompanied the military offensives on the ground.

Originally published in Hebrew, this English-language version is revised, updated and recontextualised for non-Hebrew readers who might be less familiar with the minutiae of the Israeli media. Dor's study offers a damning indictment of the varied ways in which journalists and broadcasters abandoned any attempt at impartiality or so-called objectivity in their reportage, preferring instead to comply with an ideological imperative which in effect rules out any prospect of peace, justice or mutual understanding.