One of the lessons I learned from the War on Terror and US invasions of both Afghanistan and Iraq, is that it's important to talk about the manufacture of consent for war in real time, no matter how obviously false, or rooted in motivating reasoning, the propaganda and arguments that manufacture that consent may seem to you. Long after we admit our imperial adventures are slaughterhouse catastrophes, everyone will remember the big lies, and sometimes even the big liars in the media who told them, but the reality is that the primary tool by which an always pro-war establishment manipulates public opinion to justify imperial violence is not the big lies, but an all pervasive environment of little lies, acts of framing, and the creation of a perceived mass consensus around "common sense" arguments for war rather than factual analysis. Colin Powell didn't convince Americans to support the invasion of Iraq by shaking around a vial at the UN, it was the thousands upon thousands of news stories, articles, and presentations in our discourse that portrayed Iraq as the source of all evil in the world, and the idea of *not* attacking Iraq as the unreasonable position, that did the deed in the end.
I mention this because as this article by Belén Fernåndez writing for media watchdog FAIR notes, imperialist corporate media in America is performing Olympic-level mental gymnastics to flip victim and aggressor in stories about Israel's completely illegal and unprovoked attack on Iran. A burgeoning war the US President is currently threatening to embroil America in despite the overwhelming wishes of its people.
https://fair.org/home/working-hard-to-justify-israels-unprovoked-attack-on-iran/
Working Hard to Justify Israelâs Unprovoked Attack on Iran
"Imagine for a moment that Country A launched an illegal and unprovoked attack on Country B. In any sort of objective world, you might expect media coverage of the episode to go something along the lines of: âCountry A Launches Illegal and Unprovoked Attack on Country B.â
Not so in the case of Israel, whose special relationship with the United States means it gets special coverage in the US corporate media. When Israel attacked Iran early last Friday, killing numerous civilians along with military officials and scientists, the press was standing by to present the assault as fundamentally justifiedâno surprise coming from the outlets that have for more than 20 months refused to describe Israelâs genocide of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip as genocide."
I like to share the media studies FAIR publishes because they're generally well sourced, and extremely concise; this article is no exception. The author looks at three pro-Israel propaganda arguments in particular, woven throughout corporate American media stories about the unprovoked attack, which as I've mentioned before, is almost certainly a literal fucking war crime. Specifically she examines the argument that Israel's illegal attack on Iran was pre-emptive, that being attacked by Israel is actually saving Iranians somehow, and arguments that Israel's attack on Iran echoes its (also illegal) attacks on Lebanon, which are magically transformed into a good thing in this narrative.
Virtually all of these propositions are of course utterly absurd. A "pre-emptive" strike is literally just starting an illegal war, just like it was when Bush attacked Iraq under the same logic. The idea that Iranians are thanking Israel for killing civilians to punish their government is some jingoistic absurdity. And Israel's activities in Lebanon were themselves another illegal war and dare I say, terrorism. Literally none of this makes any sense unless you're high on Zionist propaganda released directly by the Netanyahu government, and yet FernĂĄndez found reporting in corporate mainstream media outlets like the Associated Press, the Washington Post, the New York Times, and ABC all making one or more of these absurd arguments to justify Israel's again, unprovoked, illegal attack on Iran.
My friends, please let me remind you that Israel is a US client state, and could not prosecute a war against Iran (or a genocide in Gaza) without American military hardware, funding, and diplomatic support. Manufacturing consent for a regime change war, by Israel, in Iran, is in fact just manufacturing consent for a US war in Iran. American media outlets are not talking this way, or pushing these pro-war, anti-Iran propaganda arguments because it makes them feel good; they're framing any potential conflict with Iran as unambiguously justified, morally virtuous, and entirely the fault of Iranians for not overthrowing their government on our behalf by now. This, is what the manufacture of consent for war in America looks like in real time; not one big lie, but a thousand voices telling you over and over that every "reasonable" person agrees Iran had it coming.
#USA #Imperialism #War #Israel #Iran #ManufacturingConsent #Media #WaPo #NYT #Propaganda #WarOnTerror #Gaza #Genocide
