Latifa Al-Husseini

Controlling and directing the media machine during “Israel’s” brutal war on Lebanon may be as important as military operations for Tel Aviv. The “Israelis” try to hide behind the images they broadcast to manipulate public opinion at home and in the West. They ignore coverage by the Lebanese, Arab, and foreign media outlets of the ongoing “Israeli” massacres.

The enemy's objective is to highlight any achievements on Lebanese territory and capture it on camera. That’s why “Israel” ignores all international and legal norms. About two weeks after the start of the ground battle, the “Israeli” military took a team of journalists from international news agencies and American media outlets on a tour of its areas of operations in southern Lebanon. Their entry into Lebanon is described as being facilitated by the occupation army.

The ground covered is fully sovereign Lebanese territory; the tour, which lasted 90 minutes, started as the pictures suggest near Naqoura in a wooded area. The enemy drew the media’s attention to ??the supposed existence of a Hezbollah tunnel and positions 300 meters from a UNIFIL base. The tour continued near houses likely in the southern town of Blida, as the scenes broadcast show. The hoped-for result of these pictures is to reinforce the war propaganda that the resistance is deploying its arsenal and missiles and digging tunnels near civilian homes.

This is a clear violation of Lebanese territorial sovereignty, in full view of the world, especially the local trumpets that play, at all times, the tune of patriotism and independence. The matter here is no different from any previous crime of aggression on Lebanon’s borders. In the midst of war, the enemy shatters all rules and laws, penetrates deep into Lebanese territory, and then leaves to send a message through the Western media that “we control the field.”

The performance of the occupation army in the current battle in southern Lebanon confirms that propaganda is at the top of its list of priorities, especially in light of the frustration, exhaustion, and collapse experienced by the settlers in northern “Israel” as a result of the ongoing confrontation with Hezbollah.

That’s why strict censorship on content being distributed by news websites, local media, and Western networks and newspapers is being imposed in a bid to raise morale. “Israel” is shameless in the theatrics it carries out in some villages before its troops flee under fire from the resistance. This censorship also applies to foreign media representatives in the Zionist entity.

The controls that the enemy sets through the military oversight committee are therefore a tool that is equivalent to its weapons, missiles, and military arsenal. This leads to the following conclusions:

1. No free speech on military issues
2. No transparency in the results of “Israel's” ground operations on the border with Lebanon
3. No disclosure on the number of casualties – dead and wounded
4. No accurate announcements on the targets reached by the Islamic Resistance's missiles, or even the Iranian missiles in Operations True Promise 1 and 2. Here, we understand why American journalist Jeremy Loffredo was arrested on charges of revealing the sites hit by Iranian missiles.
5. No freedom for field journalists in the areas of fighting and battles in the occupied north
6. No Arab channel is allowed to be stationed inside the occupied territories so as not to transmit a narrative different from that broadcast by the enemy, through its media or the media of its Arab and foreign allies. Here, we understand why the enemy closed the offices of Al Jazeera in Ramallah and Al Mayadeen in the occupied West Bank.

The above explains the methodology of military censorship in this war and all the wars that “Israel” has fought in Lebanon. Media people, perhaps not all of them, know the extent of the enemy's control on the ground and through screens and platforms.

That is why they are required to take effective action to prevent a recurrence of the disaster of the occupation army's tour in the south and the blatant violation of Lebanese sovereignty.

The official media body, including the Ministry of Information, along with the ministries of foreign affairs and justice, as well as all media bodies operating in the country must take the initiative to support the people on the ground and prevent the advancement of such propaganda by the enemy.

They must hold accountable those foreign media outlets operating in all regions that violate the sovereignty of Lebanese territory. It is also required that such violations not pass without decisive action that restores the prestige of local laws in action, not words, so that they are not crushed by “Israeli” hands without accountability or supervision.