MiddleEast: The war of (dis)information

Completing almost a year of war between Palestinians and Israelis in the Gaza Strip, the center of gravity of military operations is shifting to the Lebanese-Israeli border between the Lebanese Hezbollah and Israel. As in any war, a parallel disinformation war is being waged to mislead the adversary and world public opinion. In the last 24 hours, the disinformation war has flared up.

The recent publications of a French newspaper but also of other western information sources circulate news which is of dubious reliability. News of the type that an “Iranian spy” betrayed Nasrallah’s location to the Israeli forces, contributing to his assassination, do not have the necessary credibility, as they are general and do not provide specific information about the time and place and the persons involved. The same applies to “news” that refer to Iran’s supposedly docile attitude towards its adversaries in relation to its allies, e.g. that allegedly Iran “gave” Ismail Haniyeh. More evidence is needed to lend credence to the news in question.

After the assassination of Ismail Haniyeh and Hassan Nasrallah, such news is circulated by the opponents of the Palestine Liberation Alliance to harm the unity of the alliance by disrupting the confidence of the allies among themselves. At the same time, they disorientate the public opinion of the warring countries and in general on a global scale.

Yet the important thing is that this kind of disinformation, wherever it comes from, is not reproduced by other media with a sense of responsibility towards to the truth and the facts, the readers and the belligerents.