The party responsible for a war crime—or any act of mass violence—is important information and something that should be named at the forefront of any news documenting said war crime or act of mass violence. This much seems obvious, but the “War in Gaza” has created a particularly grimy editorial genre of Natural Disaster-izing mass death. Specific episodes of mass killing, disease, and displacement at the hands of Israel as it carries out siege, occupation, and bombing are all too often covered like one would a deadly volcano or earthquake: The party responsible is not a specific government or military but a mysterious, agency-free “war,” “disaster,” or “humanitarian crisis.”

Israel’s responsibility is often mentioned or alluded to––typically in scare quotes––in the text further down the page, but it is not centered or made obvious, thus meaningfully reducing any political urgency around their guilt. 

The most egregious practitioner of this grim editorial genre is the New York Times, which has obscured who is killing tens of thousands in Gaza with new lows of confusion and hand-wringing. Here are just a handful of headlines published over the past eight months which one could read, and re-read a dozen times, and still not be sure who is killing whom:

Reading these headlines, it’s impossible to know who is responsible for these human tragedies. 

Take one May 6 report in the New York Times detailing how Israel’s assault has completely destroyed the education system of Gaza. “With Schools in Ruins, Education in Gaza Will Be Hobbled for Years,” read the headline. The subheadline continued, “Most of Gaza’s schools, including all of its universities, have severe damage that makes them unusable, which could harm an entire generation, the United Nations and others say.”

Not until paragraph seven does the New York Times mention who actually destroyed the schools and, even then, it’s framed as an accusation by UN officials and Palestinians. Repeatedly, both in framing and text, the cause of the annihilation of Gaza’s education system is presented as a vague, agency-free, symmetrical “war.” As if there are two equally powerful armies facing off in some type of a Napoleonic battle with unfortunate civilians on both sides caught in the middle, rather than a virtually one-way bombing, siege, and occupation of the most powerful military in the Middle East against a people with no modern defense systems. 

One nonsensical New York Times social media post from Feb. 22 reads like a parody:

Deadly strikes in Rafah, in southern Gaza, flattened the Al-Farouk mosque, seen here, on Thursday, residents and the Palestinian Authority’s news agency said. Only Israel, which declined to comment on the attacks, carries out airstrikes in Gaza.

So why not just say it was Israel? Clearly it was. It’s the obvious implication of this language, which is at war with itself. But, alas, the New York Times can’t spell out the obvious, lest they offend the crybully pro-Israel media watchers and their right-wing “liberal media”-complaining confederates.

During just one 24-hour period in June, the New York Times ran three responsibility-absolving headlines and subheadlines that capture the agency-removing ethos of the paper:

“War” has “killed” Palestinians. “Dire Conditions in Gaza” created “a multitude of amputee” Palestinians. Gaza is the world’s deadliest place for aid workers because of some abstract “devastation.” Who is causing all this suffering? Reading the headlines and subheadlines, one would have no idea. Contrast this with how the Times covers Russian war crimes. Here, agency is clear upfront, as are the deadly consequences of the guilty party’s actions. 

It is possible that the New York Times has a policy similar to that of CNN, which does not ascribe responsibility to the IDF until after Israeli officials formally confirm it. We know that CNN’s policy exists thanks to reporting from the Intercept in early January. An anonymous CNN staff member told the Intercept’s Daniel Boguslaw, “Israeli bombings in Gaza will be reported as ‘blasts’ attributed to nobody, until the Israeli military weighs in to either accept or deny responsibility. Quotes and information provided by Israeli army and government officials tend to be approved quickly, while those from Palestinians tend to be heavily scrutinized and slowly processed.”

Who did what to what? Impossible to tell from reading the headlines. In all these reports, much further into the article, Israel’s potential culpability is mentioned buried in the text

That CNN Natural Disaster-izes Gaza is thus evident in their headlines, which routinely obscure Israel’s role in the carnage being reported on. Here are a handful of the worst examples from the past few months:

Who did what to what? Impossible to tell from reading the headlines. In all these reports, much further into the article, Israel’s potential culpability is mentioned buried in the text, but typically attributed to “Hamas-run” ministries or “Gaza officials,” reducing the horrific sights to a he-said-she-said situation, despite Israel being the only party remotely capable of carrying out the attacks in question. An otherwise useful, detailed analysis of how Israel systematically destroyed the healthcare system in Gaza is framed by CNN as “How Gaza’s hospitals became battlegrounds.” 

This isn’t “hospitals” “becoming battlegrounds”—this is Israel attacking hospitals. 

Battlegrounds? Were there battles in these hospitals? No, there weren’t. For the most part, the IDF shelled them, bombed them, cleared them out to make life unsustainable, pursuant to their Oct.r 13 evacuation order of Northern Gaza. Occasionally, Palestinian fighters would attack IDF convoys as they approached hospitals, but at no point was there anything like a “battle” inside any hospital. Nor did CNN’s report show anything like this. It showed Israel attacking hospitals to clear them out, then they’d move on. This isn’t “hospitals” “becoming battlegrounds”—this is Israel attacking hospitals. 

Again, contrast this Fog of War, who’s-to-say-who-did-what framing with how CNN covered Russian attacks on hospitals in a straightforward way. “Deadly Russian strikes obliterate Dnipro medical facility in central Ukraine,” read one headline from May 2023. “Anatomy of the Mariupol hospital attack,” read one March 22 headline. “Medical facilities and workers have been repeatedly hit by Russian forces since their invasion of Ukraine, despite this being against the rules of war.” the subhead stated. “Russian missile strike on Zaporizhzhia maternity hospital kills newborn baby,” a November 2022 CNN headline reads.

When it comes to Ukraine, responsibility is clear, the nature of the crime apparent and the moral implications are obvious. With Israel’s repeated war crimes against Gaza, agency is removed and the human suffering is framed like the result of a mudslide or earthquake. 

Another recent example: Last week the Associated Press did a deep dive investigation into entire Palestinian families being wiped out by Israel, and even then framed the culprit not as a military, a government, or even a leader of Israel, but as a nebulous “war.” “The war in Gaza,” the headline read, “has wiped out entire Palestinian families. AP documents 60 who lost dozens or more.”

A different AP report from Wednesday read, “the war has largely cut off the flow of food, medicine and other supplies to Palestinians who are facing widespread hunger.”

But “war” didn’t wipe out entire Palestinian families, nor did “war” cut off food and medicine to Palestinians in Gaza—Israel did. And we know this because, as several genocide scholars and the International Court of Justice clearly documented, Israeli officials kicked off their revenge campaign on Oct. 7 with explicitly genocidal intent. While the AP has been better at framing stories of mass death with a responsible party than the New York Times and CNN, they too often fall into the agency-removal trap. 

Polls show over half of Americans frequently don’t read past the headline, so how our news is framed for the passing media consumer is of tremendous importance

Another reason for the widespread Natural Disaster-izing of Gaza is that pro-Israel pressure groups are constantly working the refs, whining to editors, reporters, and media owners that the media is being too hard on Israel. This crybully campaign escalated to great effect after the Al-Ahli Arab Hospital bombing on Oct. 17 where, allegedly, a single Palestinian Islamic Jihad rocket killed over 200 people (despite approximately 1,800 Hamas/PIJ rockets landing in Israel and killing only 15 people in the first three months of war, but this is a different article). After this incident, headline writers became uniquely allergic to assigning Israel blame for anything, lest they be subject to the faked outrage of those seeking to make the Times and CNN look like Hamas mouthpieces. 

Obviously, there is more to news reporting than headlines, subheadlines, and framing. But polls show over half of Americans frequently don’t read past the headline, so how our news is framed for the passing media consumer is of tremendous importance, politically. This is why pro-Israel media bullies put so many resources into attacking outlets that center Israel’s responsibility for the daily atrocity they are reporting on. They know it matters. And it matters that a deliberate, well-documented strategy of mass killing, displacement, and very likely genocide by a specific party that has repeatedly express genocidal intent, is obscured and removed from the reporting. And, instead, the suffering that appears on people’s TV screens and social media timelines is given the “Oh, Dearism” treatment, something with no author, no cause. Because, after all, if it’s not the US and its allies doing the killing, what can be done about it other than generally feeling bad and moving on? 

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Adam Johnson hosts the Citations Needed podcast and writes at The Column on Substack. Follow him @adamjohnsonCHI.