The media has always been considered a powerful tool in swaying public opinion one way or the other. If an article is good, it influences the reader and even implants misconceptions about this or that subject in a way so subtle, the bias goes unnoticed. If the article is not so good, the bias is too obvious and an intelligent reader will simply brush it aside.

For years, the Palestinians have grown accustomed to the fact that the western media, the American in particular, has always been biased towards Israel vis-à-vis the conflict. Given that Israel is the United States’ spoiled baby, this can only be expected. However, now that the conflict has spread to Lebanon, the expectation was that the mainstream Western media would be a little more responsible.

It has been almost two weeks since Israel began its aggression on Lebanon following the capture of two Israeli soldiers by Hizbullah fighters at the Lebanese-Israeli border. Since then, Israel has launched countless air and ground strikes against Lebanese targets in southern Lebanon and in the capital, Beirut while Hizbullah has lobbed hundreds of Katushas into northern Israel, including Haifa.

Needless to say, hundreds of people have been killed, mostly innocent Lebanese civilians. Official Lebanese sources put the number of Lebanese killed in the war as of July 23 at 380 with over 1,000 wounded. Israel has lost approximately 36, including civilians killed as a result of Hizbullah rockets and soldiers killed in the fighting with Hizbullah guerillas near the border.

In addition, the Lebanese infrastructure has been badly damaged in the air raids. Power plants, bridges, the airport, roads and television stations have all been hit in an Israeli attempt to “set Lebanon back 20 years.”

What is so mind-boggling here is that even reputable western media outlets are towing the line of the US government and the Israeli propaganda machine. On mainstream US television news channels such as ABC and CBS, reporters gave detailed descriptions of the “empty Haifa streets” and the shelters Israelis are forced to hide in when the Hizbullah rockets are fired. On Good Morning America last week, the anchorman decided it would be more beneficial if the number of those killed in the war so far was not broken down into Lebanese and Israelis. Instead the report claimed, “Over 250 people have been killed so far on both sides.” No matter that over 200 of these were Lebanese.

No doubt, if the casualty list had been reversed and over 200 Israelis had been killed, the media would have been all over it, giving the personal life stories of many of them, bringing the personal tragedy of the conflict straight into the public’s living rooms.

It is not that no western media outlets have given accounts of the effects of this war on the Lebanese. The BBC – which by the way has been accused by Israel of biasness towards the Palestinians on countless occasions - has a reporter in South Lebanon as well as in northern Haifa. Even CNN, known for their pro-Israeli slant posted a heart-wrenching story on their website on July 23 about a Lebanese family trying to escape the fighting but were hit by an Israeli bomb that killed the father and severely wounded four of the children.

However, it is the overall premise on which the reporting is being disseminated that is so disturbing, a premise that was established from day one. Anyone reading or listening to the mainstream western media accepts it as a given that Hizbullah is at best, a “militant” organization and at worst a “terrorist” one. None describe it as part of the Lebanese resistance.

On the less reputable Fox News website, their cover story on the conflict on July 24 begins like this:

“Mideast diplomats were pressing Syria to stop backing Hizbullah as the terrorists fired more deadly rockets onto Israel’s third-largest city Sunday.”

In this sentence alone, incriminations are flying everywhere. First, it brings Syria into the mix, insinuating that it is involved in supporting and funding Hizbullah. Secondly, it flatly calls Hizbullah “terrorists”, a term the western media often uses loosely to describe any party opposed to the US’s short-sighted plans in the region.

Finally, the Fox writer puts his final slant on the opening paragraph, describing the rockets as “deadly” and emphasizing that [Haifa] is Israel’s third largest city- i.e. Hizbullah is trying to hit as many civilian targets as possible.

While the Fox article can certainly be considered one of the more abhorrent pieces written about the war, the biasness should not be shocking to anyone given the official US government stance, which has hardly tried to conceal its blunt prejudice with Israel.

Besides putting the blame for the escalating violence squarely on Hizbullah, the United States has also made it clear that it is giving Israel a free hand to finish off what it started. The two captured soldiers are actually the last on Israel’s (and America’s) priority list. Rather, Israel has openly said it would continue its aggression until it destroyed Hizbullah’s infrastructure and ensured that it would not return to the southern Lebanese border. Israel’s foreign minister, Tzipi Livni was even so presumptuous to suggest that Israel’s offensive was aimed at “helping” the Lebanese government to assume sovereignty over the south instead of allowing it to remain in the hands of Hizbullah.

While the international community and Arab countries are calling on the United States to pressure for a ceasefire, the US has declared that it would do no such thing. In line with Israel’s position, US Secretary of State Condeleezza Rice has said that although a ceasefire is “urgent” certain conditions must be met before it is put into place, namely that Hizbullah could not maintain the same status in the south. Basically, what this means is that the United States is allowing Israel to continue its strikes against Lebanon until it completes its mission of destroying Hizbullah, the only remaining threat to Israel in the immediate vicinity.

With this sort of propaganda being perpetuated by the US government, which post-September 11 has given itself a carte blanche to freely throw around the term “terrorism,” the western media feels it is not obligated to dig deeper for a truer version of the events. It is easy to mold information into words, even eloquently. What is real talent and the responsibility of any serious and conscientious journalist is to look beyond what is handed to you and find the real story, the real power plays in motion and most importantly, the real tragedies befalling real lives.

Joharah Baker is a Writer for the Media and Information Programme at the Palestinian Initiative for the Promotion of Global Dialogue and Democracy (MIFTAH). She could be contacted at mip@miftah.org