How France's media became a mouthpiece of Israeli propaganda

Despite an apparently greater interest shown in the horrific fate of the Palestinians between May and October this year, in alignment with the slightly more critical declarations of western governments, France's mainstream media never stopped uncritically echoing Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's rhetoric, even as Palestinians were being decimated before our eyes.

This small, temporary shift in tone did not signal any change in their overwhelmingly pro-Israeli positions, but rather a moment of damage control during the worst phase of the genocide.

French media - and, to varying extents, those of many other countries - were thus forced to at least pretend to be more critical of Israel and grant more space to the plight of the Palestinians.

Yet at the same time, they deployed a range of strategies that effectively cancelled out that already mild and momentary inflexion in their reporting, allowing them to continue toeing Israel's official line as closely as possible.

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