“Truth under the rubble” is the pointed title of UN Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese’s report on the news media industry with regards to the ongoing genocide in Palestine. The report is divided into three interconnected sections: first, the systematic targeting of Palestinian media workers and media infrastructure; second, Israeli media and their boosting of genocidal incitement and genocide denial; and third, the role of influential Western media and digital platforms, specifically, liberal media such as BBC, CNN and the New York Times.
Madhuri Sastry and I offer a breakdown, analysis and impact of this report here👇🏾
Albanese’s report is short, but shocking in the sheer amount of information and statistics it manages to include. Running at less than thirty pages, it is written in accessible language and provides evidence on Israeli and Western media roles in narrating, mediating, obscuring, fabricating and denying the ongoing genocide of Palestinians, and in covering up the killing of Palestinian media workers. The report contains horrifying statistics on journalists killed (300+), wounded (400+), incarcerated and tortured (100+) as well as the number of journalists’ homes (150+) and families (700+) targeted.
Albanese’s report coins the term “mediacide” and concludes powerfully:
“Genocide depends not only on the destruction of human beings, but also on the destruction of the political, moral and evidentiary conditions that make that destruction visible, intelligible and contestable. When witnesses are silenced, when dehumanizing language becomes ordinary and when independent verification is displaced by the claims of the perpetrator, violence acquires the appearance of legitimacy and impunity becomes easier to sustain.”
The report’s investigation into liberal, Western media outlets is particularly validating because it supports the work we have been doing on the Radical Books Collective. We have been active in calling out liberal media and in attempting to educate our audience about the importance of cultural and historical narratives that shape not only hearts and minds but also real politics. The report cites Israel’s and the West’s heavy investments (millions and millions of dollars) in media orgs and digital platforms. If they take the shaping of cultural narratives extremely seriously then we must do the same if we are to resist and refuse their version of the story.
You can read the full report here.
Coincidentally, we also hosted another conversation recently that engaged in a similar discussion about “journacide.” A documentary by Irish filmmaker Seán Murray investigates the Israeli killing of journalists in southern Lebanon employing the “double tap” strikes that were also discussed in Albanese’s report. Murray spoke with historian Sherry Zane about his documentary film Journacide: The War on Truth. They also spoke about journalism and news today, the counter-archive of bearing witness through murals, Ireland’s history of solidarity with Palestine, and the importance of documentary filmmaking in an era of misinformation and short-form feeds. Watch it here👇🏾
Albanese’s report sounds the alarm on the fact that today, “truth is under the rubble.” Yet, it is heartening to see the publication of this important report alongside the slow but steady rise in documentaries and books about an egregious and criminal Western and Israeli media engaged in propagating lies and genocide denial.
Adding to the feeling of hope was this week’s energetic and exciting Free Palestine concert tour by Macklemore and friends. Over 15,000 enthusiastic people packed the Accor Arena in Paris. It was an electric evening featuring talented Palestinian, Indigenous and Black musicians tying together their histories and struggles against settler colonialism, apartheid and land dispossession worldwide. Francesca Albanese also made a cameo and the crowds went wild for her. Never before has a UN Special Rapporteur who writes dense reports on human rights been this popular, and that shows, in no uncertain terms, that the tide is certainly turning in favor of Palestine. It was beautiful to see. Watch the highlights below👇🏾
Love and solidarity❤️🔥
Bhakti Shringarpure
Upcoming Book Club!
Nov 15, 2026: Book club, Salt in the Snow: A Somali Immigrant Story by Sahra Noor
Sahra Noor will be in conversation with Bhakti Shringarpure about her memoir Salt in the Snow: A Somali Immigration Story (Catalyst Press), a coming-of age story about growing up amid two cultures, about a bond with her father, and reflecting on home, belonging, migration and motherhood.
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