How Hamas Manipulates the Media and Controls the Narrative About Its War With Israel

 (Full report from Honest Reporting can be read here )

Throughout the current Israel-Hamas war, Honest Reporting has exposed ties between employees of mainstream media organizations and the terrorist rulers of the Gaza Strip.

From freelancers who crossed into southern Israel with Hamas terrorists during the October 7 massacre to Palestinian journalists who were honored by Hamas for their collaborative work with the Hamas Government Media Office, there is strong evidence for Hamas’ control and manipulation of the narratives that emerge from the Gaza Strip and help shape the way that the conflict is reported on around the world.

However, it is not only local Gazan journalists whose work falls under the tyrannical thumb of Hamas. Hamas has also wielded its violent power to censor the reports of foreign journalists and ensure that only news sanctioned by the internationally recognized terror group sees the light of day.

Operation Protective Edge (2014). There is no better example of this suppression of press freedom than the media guidelines that were released by Hamas during Operation Protective Edge (July – August 2014).

According to an August 2014 report released by the Meir Amit Intelligence and Information Center, both the Hamas-run Ministry of Interior and the Hamas-affiliated Palestinian Journalist Bloc released guidelines during the early days of the Operation on how social media users and traditional media personnel located in Gaza should report the conflict.

A key instruction by Hamas was to never publish information about or share photos of rockets, to not publicize the proximity of rocket launchers to densely populated civilian areas.

Other regulations that Hamas set out for social media users during Operation Protective Edge included the requirement to refer to all killed Gazans as “innocent,” to never share an up-close photograph of Hamas members, and all Hamas activity as being in response to Israeli actions.

The regulations and their enforcement by Hamas were so severe that even the Foreign Press Association in Israel was forced to release a statement on August 11, 2014, condemning the “blatant, incessant, forceful and unorthodox methods employed by the Hamas authorities and their representatives against visiting international journalists in Gaza over the past month.”

When some foreign journalists in Gaza did acknowledge the close proximity of rocket launchers to civilian areas. In some cases, these journalists only publicized their experience once they had left the Gaza Strip (and were outside Hamas’ realm) while others were forced to leave the Strip soon after issuing their reports.

In January 2024, the Hamas Media Office published a booklet entitled “Our Narrative…Operation Al-Aqsa Flood.” This document, which sought to justify and contextualize the terror group’s October 7 attack against southern Israel, was released in both Arabic and English. The publication of a Hamas document in both languages was unusual and shows how the group is intent on not only influencing Arab public opinion but also the opinion of those residing in the West.

“Our Narrative” is a masterpiece of propaganda and misinformation, replete with claims such as:

• Hamas was only attacking military sites and never attacks civilians;
• Many of the victims were killed by Israel and not Hamas;
• This “battle” started 105 years ago, and Hamas was backed into a corner and forced to attack Israel.

Both Agence France-Presse (AFP) and Voice of America (VOA) fell for Hamas’ propaganda machine and publicized the terror group’s baseless claims, giving it legitimacy.

In retrospect, however, given the prevalence of sources branding Hamas as a “national liberation” group, battling “colonialism,” it’s clear that the Hamas narrative has found a receptive audience in too many places. The Hamas document even called for an International Criminal Court (ICC) investigation, preempting the arrest warrants issued against Benjamin Netanyahu and former defense minister Yoav Gallant.

Through Hamas’ issuance of constricting media guidelines in 2014 and 2022, its use of violence against opposition journalists, the recently unearthed evidence of collaboration by certain Palestinian freelancers with the terror group, and its propaganda campaigns focused on influencing mainstream media outlets, it is clear that any news emerging from Gaza must be treated with a critical eye and not taken at face value.