The traditional role of the media as reporters of the truth can play an important role in conflicts. A key function of the media is to provide the public with the information necessary to make good decisions. It is important to realize that decisions are not only based on events but also very much on how events are presented. The media can seek to confirm or question official accounts, reveal official deceit, and correct errors of omission. Recent advances in the field of information technology have enabled the media to have a much greater impact on public opinion than ever before. The media provide the public with an indispensable service. It is one of the pillars of modern society.

Since the 1993 Oslo Accords which brought limited autonomy to Palestinian society, the tasks of the Palestinian media have changed radically. On the one hand, the media is expected to contribute to nation-building based on the prospective that the endgame of the Accords will be an independent, free, and democratic Palestinian state. On the other hand, it must deal with the reality that most of the Palestinian territory that will be the territory of the future Palestinian state is still occupied, and that it would indeed be early to shift the focus of the media away from the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. However, the two missions should not have to contradict each other since an honest, authentic, investigative, non-biased and informative media will serve both goals.

The spirit of the Oslo Accords made confidence-building between Palestinians and Israelis an indispensable condition to moving ahead in the peace process, and it gave the media in Palestine and Israel a decisive role in the difficult process of creating this crucial common ground. However, the failure of Camp David negotiations in July 2000 and the eruption of the second Intifada soon afterwards proved both sides’ failure in achieving this mission.

Acknowledging the importance of the media in the Palestinian-Israeli conflict in particular, MIFTAH-The Palestinian Initiative for the Promotion of Global Dialogue and Democracy and KESHEV-Center for Protection of Democracy in Israel agreed to launch a joint project monitoring media coverage and professionalism on both the Palestinian and Israeli sides. The project will ultimately facilitate the development of an independent media and a culture of moderation, tolerance, and understanding between the two peoples, through monitoring, research, advocacy, and lobbying activities without jeopardizing the freedom of expression. What follows is a report on the first stage of this research project, scheduled to continue through 2005 and 2006

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Summary

This is the first report issued by Keshev in the project "Media Monitoring—Words Can Kill, Too". This unique project, carried out in coordination between Keshev, an Israeli organization, and Miftah, a Palestinian organization, examines media coverage on both sides of the conflict. The goal of the project is to change patterns of media coverage in Israel and in the Palestinian Authority that give expression to prejudice, incitement and defamation, misrepresentation, de-legitimization and dehumanization of the other side.

This report examines coverage of Arafat's illness and death in three Israeli daily newspapers (Yediot Aharonot, Ma'ariv and Ha'aretz) and in the main television news editions (Channel 1, Channel 2 and Channel 10), from the first reports of his illness on October 25, 2004, until November 19, a few days after his burial.

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Introduction

This is the second report that MIFTAH-The Palestinian Initiative for the Promotion of Democracy-issues in coordination with Keshev- Center for the Protection of Democracy in Israel-on the media coverage of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. The goal of the project is to facilitate the development of a bold and professional media, and a culture of tolerance, moderation and understanding between the two peoples, through monitoring, research, advocacy and lobbying activities without jeopardizing the freedom of expression.

In our first report, issued in March 2005, we studied the Palestinian media landscape extensively, paying special attention to its components and its shortcomings, as well as to the overriding circumstances under which it operates. We also reviewed our work methodology and presented our definitions of such issues as incitement, dehumanization, de-legitimization of the other, and other forms of bias, acknowledging that these definitions were developed by MIFTAH, and that there may be others with which we may agree or disagree.

In the first report, we focused mainly on the way the media covered the unilateral Gaza Disengagement Plan and the Road Map. We also focused on the coverage of the victims of the conflict on both sides, highlighting in particular, what is ignored by the Palestinian media. We reached several conclusions, the most important of which was the fact that nothing qualified the labeling of the Palestinian media as "incitement to violence." We did find, however, that there were instances of bias, the most important of which was a lack of objectivity in covering the Road Map. We also found no criticism of some Palestinian militant groups’ activities, some of which contradict international laws. We also found that the human dimension is absent from the conflict, and the victims are treated as mere abstract figures, in a way that denies the conflict its human dimension, without which it becomes difficult to embark on a bridge-building process which can help in reaching a just and durable solution based on international law.

At the end of the report, we recalled the recommendations made by the Media Monitoring Unit in its analysis of the media coverage of the Presidential Elections in January 2005. The essence of these recommendations was the adoption of a modern media law that liberates the media from the power and domination of the state or any other authority which may deter it from carrying out its task freely and objectively.

What characterizes our first report is a concentration on the print media, because we did not, at the time, have sufficient material to issue an elaborate enough report on the Palestinian Satellite Channel, since we only started monitoring it in the middle of December 2004. In this report, however, we focus on the Palestinian Satellite Channel, as well as on the print media.

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This is an urgent and repeated appeal to the world to immediately intervene, in light of the recent stories of rape and sexual violence against Palestinian women by Israeli occupation forces during Israel’s genocide in Gaza. Palestinian women are being displaced, tortured, killed and forcibly disappeared, while the world sits idle. Silence and inaction in the wake of these horrifying crimes amount to complicity.

Over the past few days, more horrifying testimonies and stories have emerged from Gaza of sadistic acts by Israeli soldiers, including torture, rape, and mass field executions at hospitals where civilians are seeking shelter, medical treatment and refuge.

Palestinian civil society and UN experts have sounded the alarm multiple times and reported cases of rape and sexual violence before and during this genocide. These reports continue to be deliberately and inexcusably ignored, including by prominent and otherwise vocal feminist organizations and figures.

The deafening silence of “Western” feminists and mainstream media in particular is deliberate and inexcusable, as opposed to their earlier outrage over Israeli allegations and misinformation, used to justify this genocide.

Many Palestinian women and girls who are survivors of rape and sexual violence are hesitant to come forward, due to the social stigma in a conservative society and the belief that Israel will not be held accountable for such crimes.

Israel is committing the most horrific war crimes, and weaponizing rape and sexual violence against Palestinians as part of its genocide in Gaza and assault on the Palestinian people as a whole, throughout all of Palestine. This is the result of decades of impunity, preferential treatment and lack of international accountability by the international community. Words are not enough to describe or stop this horror; action is needed.

We conclude this SOS appeal by reminding our sisters and allies around the world that our rights, our dignity, and our humanity are indivisible. Forsaking Palestinian victims now for political convenience would be an unforgivable betrayal to decades of sacrifice and feminist struggle.

We call for:

• The international community must employ all available tools of international accountability, including political and economic sanctions, to bring an immediate and lasting ceasefire and provision of unconditional humanitarian aid.

• States must immediately impose an arms embargo on Israel and honor their moral and legal obligations, including those pronounced in the Genocide Convention.

• States need to investigate and prosecute Israeli soldiers with dual citizenship implicated in these atrocities.

• The Special Representative of the Secretary General on Sexual Violence in Conflict must honor her mandate and launch an immediate investigation into the ongoing atrocities.

• Feminists around the world must sound the alarm globally on the unspeakable human rights violations taking place in Gaza, namely the sexual abuse and rape of Palestinian women and girls.

• Journalists and media outlets must do their due diligence in reporting on these stories through fair and unbiased coverage.

Signatories:

1. American Federation of Ramallah Palestine
2. Association of women’s Action
3. AWMR Italia - Donne della Regione Mediterranea
4. Bisan Center for Research and Development
5. Community Development and Media Center
6. Cultura è libertà una campagna per la Palestina
7. Enjaz Foundation for development
8. Filastiniyat
9. Human Rights and Democracy Media Center SHAMS
10. Institute of Women's Studies
11. Not to forget women society
12. Palestinian Center for Development and Media Freedoms (MADA)
13. Palestinian Women's Action committee
14. Rete Femminista Marche Molto+di194
15. Rural Women Development Society
16. Sinal do Vale
17. Singola
18. Teaching Palestine: Pedagogical Praxis and the Indivisibility of Justice
19. The center for defense of liberties and civil rights “Hurryyat”
20. The Palestinian Initiative for the Promotion of Global Dialogue and Democracy - MIFTAH
21. The Palestinian Working Woman Society for Development-PWWSD
22. The Regional Coalition for Women Human Rights Defenders in Southwest Asia and North Africa (WHRDMENA)
23. Union of Palestinian Women Committees
24. Wattan media network
25. Women Media and Development
26. Women's International League for Peace and Freedom
27. رابطة المرأة العراقية
28. شبكة المستقبل الديمقراطية العراقية

We, at the Palestinian NGO Forum to Combat Violence against Women and all Arab women’s and rights organizations raise our voices loud and clear on the eve of March 8, to say: “Stop the onslaught and crimes against women and children in Gaza. Stop the crime of genocide, the crime of starvation and forced displacement”. So far, this aggression has resulted in the killing of 31,000 Palestinians, over 70% of whom are women and children. Two women are killed every hour , in addition to many others still under the rubble. There are women whose fate is unknown, after being taken away by occupation forces.

Who will restore normalcy for us Palestinian women after these atrocities?

We have always held activities on March 8. We had a long list of rights we demanded and others we were able to achieve. However today, as the women of Gaza are being annihilated, we stand the length and breadth of our homeland and our Arab nations, angry, in a state of revolution and in deep mourning. Our demand today is to halt the genocide in the Gaza Strip and to halt the reproductive genocide against our women. We declare this day the day of Palestinian women, as they stand hungry in long queues, waiting for insufficient aid, terrified of the skies above them, filled with missiles of death. This is for the women whose bodies are exhausted, in camps for the displaced and in shelter centers, for those raped in prison and for their naked bodies stripped at checkpoints. It is for the menstruating women who cannot find sanitary products and for those with high-risk pregnancies who are starving, displaced and bombed. It is for the women whose wombs may be removed for the simplest of medical complications and those whose privacy has been violated because of overcrowded tents and displacement. It is for the mothers who could die at any moment and for all women whose Palestinianism has crucified humanity at the altar, amid deafening Arab silence, boundless American support and the complicity of several European countries.

Nevertheless, we continue to appreciate all forms of Arab and international support and solidarity with the Palestinian cause, which shows respect for our people’s dignity. Widening this solidarity will further reaffirm the justness of our cause. Hence, we await more action and movements in solidarity of our right to demand an immediate end to the genocide in the Gaza Strip, the West Bank and Jerusalem, to forge our way forward towards freedom, self-determination and the establishment of an independent and fully-sovereign Palestinian state.

Today, we Palestinian and Arab women, reaffirm the following on March 8 and every day forward:

- To put pressure on Israel to immediately halt its aggression and to hold its leaders accountable for their crimes in violation of international law, the Fourth Geneva Convention and all international laws and treaties, towards delegitimizing this occupying entity.

- To open the Rafah Crossing and all crossings to allow aid in and the wounded out for treatment

- To dismantle the land corridor linking Israel with some Arab countries supplying it with goods

Long Live Palestinian Women, who stand steadfast and resistant in the face of the Zionist aggression We speak in the voices of Gaza’s women and say:

Halt the genocide…halt the onslaught immediately!

In a recent statement, nearly five months into the Israeli genocide in Gaza, several UN experts confirmed the various reports and testimonies that have been coming from Palestinian women and human rights organizations for months now. In Gaza, women have been kidnapped and forcibly disappeared and placed in dire conditions in undisclosed locations. In the occupied West Bank, released prisoners testified on the horrific realities inside Israeli prisons and the widespread torture and ill-treatment where sexual violence is used as a weapon employed against both women and men. The targeting of women and girls with such atrocious crimes is targeting the most vulnerable, in an attempt to break and degrade the society as a whole.

The inaction and failure of the international community to stop Israeli crimes, namely the ongoing genocide in Gaza, and other heinous crimes all across Palestine for decades now has emboldened Israel to act with impunity. This allows Israel to continue committing horrific crimes against Palestinian women and girls, namely rape and other forms of sexual violence and torture.

The silence of “Western” feminists has also been appalling, given their earlier outrage about unsubstantiated Israeli allegations which were used to justify and commit the ongoing genocide in Gaza.

First and foremost, we demand an immediate ceasefire and the unconditional provision of humanitarian aid. In order to put an end to such heinous crimes and impunity, we reiterate the need for an independent international investigation into all crimes, especially sexual violence, followed by international accountability for the perpetrators.