When Terrorism Needs a Co-Author: The Rise of ‘Both Sides’ Journalism |
Both-sides-ism in the Israel context is not a call for balance; it is a rhetorical laundering mechanism that turns terrorism into a ‘perspective,’ recasts victims as participants, and weaponizes moral equivalence to restrain Israel while legitimizing its attackers.
Atrocity, Now With Commentary
In most parts of the world, murder is followed by condemnation. In the case of Israel, it is followed by a panel discussion.
There was a time when moral clarity required no explanation. People were killed, killers were condemned, and the rest of us resisted the urge to reinterpret the murderer’s biography. That simplicity, however, does not survive long in modern discourse.
Because here, the script changes almost immediately.
An attack occurs. Civilians are murdered. Before the facts are even settled, the narrative begins its familiar shift—from clarity to conversation, from outrage to analysis.
And then, almost inevitably:
“Both sides must show restraint.”
As though a family hiding in a safe room and a gunman trying to burn them out are simply two participants in a particularly heated debate.
This is the essence of “both-sides-ism”: a reflexive insistence on symmetry where none exists. It is not confusion. It is a method—a way of editing reality until it becomes easier to discuss.
The Invention of “Both Sides” — Moral Clarity, Edited Out
“Both sides” sounds reasonable—who could object to balance? But in practice, it is less a principle than a performance.
There was a time—not long ago, though it now feels like ancient history—when massacres were treated with a refreshing lack of ambiguity. People were killed, the killers were condemned, and the rest of us managed to resist the intellectual urge to workshop the murderer’s emotional journey.
That era, regrettably, did not survive contact with Israel.
Because somewhere between a bus bombing in Haifa and the livestreamed atrocities of the October 7 attacks, a remarkable evolution occurred in global discourse. Terrorism, we were informed, is no longer an act. It is a conversation. Preferably one moderated by people who weren’t there, don’t understand it, and are very concerned about “tone.”
In conflicts involving Israel, it does not clarify reality; it reshapes it. A terrorist attack becomes a “cycle.” A massacre becomes a “development.” The moral line between victim and perpetrator is blurred just enough to avoid drawing a conclusion. This is a pattern long observed in Media Studies as “false balance”—the artificial equalization of unequal realities. It is not neutral; it is selective framing.
The language does the work. As noted by George Orwell, political language often exists “to make lies sound truthful.” Here, it makes clarity feel simplistic.
And so terrorism is no longer simply condemned—it is contextualized. The result is not balance, but the quiet removal of moral certainty, one carefully chosen phrase at a time.
The Speed of Distortion
If “both-sides-ism” were merely an intellectual error, it would at least have the........