Since MK Tally Gotliv burst into our lives, Minister Miri Regev has become a sort of British aristocrat compared to her heir – in royal mannerisms, in restraint, in style, in English and in understatement. But with the torch-lighting ceremony, the duchess from Rosh Ha’ayin awoke and resumed being Miri Regev again. She has an idea: Should a protest break out during the ceremony, the media channels will broadcast a recording of the dress rehearsal.
That is certainly an idea. It would spare the holy audience from unpleasant spectacles, and on the eve of the 75th Independence Day, mind you. Let them demonstrate on Mount Herzl, shout, protest, rage, we won’t tell you about it. And if we don’t tell, it didn’t happen. Happy Independence Day, Israel. Unintentionally, Regev merely suggested expanding what is already the Israeli media’s customary behavior.
Mediating reality by omitting the truth and distorting it is, after all, the daily bread of the broadcast channels. When a youngster fights for his home and dignity and is shot to death for it – television broadcasts only the dress rehearsal, which is the falsehoods that the IDF spokesman feeds it. They don’t show us life under occupation, only the rehearsal. Thus we are spared the unpleasantness of watching the harsh scenes, the protest or the suffering that we cause.
Likewise, when Israel attacks in Syria or Gaza, the TV channels show us only the official narration – so that nobody will have any idea what we’re attacking, whom we’re killing and what we’re destroying – and mainly, why.
Retired IDF spokeswoman Regev’s entire crime was that she wanted to take the lying propaganda she had been in charge of in her heyday, and extend it to Mount Herzl. What’s wrong with that? How is that worse than the other false narrations we’re force-fed ad nauseam? When exactly have they shown us reality on television, regarding the occupation in particular, but in general as well? When have they held a real discussion there about anything?
The inconceivable ignorance of average Israelis about the goings on not far from their home, and maybe also their obtuseness, stem first and foremost from the narrations broadcast to them on television, instead of the actual scenes.
What do you know about Jenin refugee camp? And what do you want to know? Only the hackneyed narration about the “terrorists’ nest.” And what do you know about the lives (and at times the deaths) of hundreds of thousands of Palestinian youngsters, about their dreams and their chances? Only what they’ve told you in the narration. Israeli television has mostly become Regev’s recording studio: sheer nonsense instead of painful reality; bread (cooking programs) and circuses (reality shows) instead of life itself. And mainly, propaganda instead of truth. Each channel with its own propaganda, and all of them together conceal the most crucial issue: the occupation.
But the minister’s proposal, which will probably be scrapped by the channels’ knights of truth, has also opened a fascinating window on the unbelievable holiness of the Israeli national ceremonies. Such vigilance in anticipation of hollow ceremonies hasn’t been seen for a long time. Who will light the torch? This has become an existential question. Only the question of who will come to the military cemetery plots surpasses it for fatefulness. The proposals compete with each other in absurdity: to dictate uniform speeches to all the politicians, or to prevent entry to the cemeteries to those who didn’t serve in the army. As always, in the choice between the important and the insignificant, Israel chooses the latter.
This must be said: Sterile ceremonies, just like sterile broadcasts, are false ceremonies. It’s okay to protest anywhere, even in cemeteries; everything should be reported, that too. Israelis’ sensitive souls, including those of the bereaved families, will withstand it, without mediation or concealment. Bereavement is in any case an extremely private matter. Meanwhile, a protest is already brewing against the main rehearsal, just to be safe. That’s how it is in the state of sheer nonsense.
Israel's Independence Day Reality Show
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20.04.2023
Since MK Tally Gotliv burst into our lives, Minister Miri Regev has become a sort of British aristocrat compared to her heir – in royal mannerisms, in restraint, in style, in English and in understatement. But with the torch-lighting ceremony, the duchess from Rosh Ha’ayin awoke and resumed being Miri Regev again. She has an idea: Should a protest break out during the ceremony, the media channels will broadcast a recording of the dress rehearsal.
That is certainly an idea. It would spare the holy audience from unpleasant spectacles, and on the eve of the 75th Independence Day, mind you. Let them demonstrate on Mount Herzl, shout, protest, rage, we won’t tell you about it. And if we don’t tell, it didn’t happen. Happy Independence Day, Israel. Unintentionally, Regev merely suggested expanding what is already the Israeli media’s customary behavior.
Mediating reality by omitting the truth and distorting it is, after all, the daily bread of the broadcast channels. When a youngster fights for his home and dignity........
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