Israeli lies and western complicity: How deceit became a weapon of war

Throughout its long history of ethnic cleansing and occupation, Israel has remained consistent in its tactics: lie, deny, and distort the truth—often with the backing, or at least the indulgence, of Western powers. Lying has become an Israeli art form, refined over decades, practiced with impunity, and amplified by a complicit global media that not only tolerates but actively legitimises these falsehoods.

The latest massacre at the food distribution in Gaza offers yet another stark and sickening reminder of this pattern. At dawn on Sunday, 1^st June, more than 30 Palestinians were murdered while waiting for food aid in Rafah. As usual, Israel swiftly denied responsibility, claiming its army was unaware of any shooting near the American-led distribution center. But eyewitnesses, survivors, humanitarian organisations, and hospitals told a contradictory story.

Israel’s denial was immediately echoed—and defended by American officials. The U.S. ambassador—better described as Israel’s emissary within the State Department—dismissed reports of the massacre as “fake news.” This grotesque inversion of truth is a familiar maneuver, reminiscent of the Flour Massacre on 29 February, 2024, when Israeli forces opened fire on civilians collecting flour, killing 112 and injuring over 760.

Again, Israel denied responsibility, claiming the deaths resulted from “stampedes” and civilians being run over by aid trucks. Yet even after the United Nations and media outlets like Al Jazeera challenged the Israeli disinformation and presented video footage clearly showing Israeli forces firing on unarmed civilians, no accountability followed.

In Gaza, it is not just food aid sites have become death traps. Ambulances are targets. First responders, doctors, and even their children have become “legitimate” military objectives.

Last week, Israel targeted the home of Dr Alaa al-Najjar, killing nine of her ten children—Yahya (12), Eve (9), Rival (5), Sadeen (3), Rakan (10), Ruslan (7), Jibran (8), Luqman (2), and Sedar, not yet one year old. Her husband, Dr Hamdi al-Najjar, succumbed to his injuries days later. Their tenth child, 11-year-old Adam, sustained a critical head injury and is unlikely to survive due to Gaza’s medical blockade.

Israel’s standard, callous response followed, explaining that its aircraft had struck “a number of suspects” in Khan Younis.

In March, the Israeli army murdered eight medics, six civil defense workers, and a United Nations employee—then buried them in the sand. The military later blamed the “suspicious behavior” of an ambulance for the attack. When confronted with video evidence disproving the claim, the army reverted to its usual script: “a mistake,” “a wrong decision,” “disciplinary action taken.” Fifteen lives erased with a bureaucratic shrug.

When Israel murdered seven humanitarian workers from the World Central Kitchen in April 2024, the Biden administration initially expressed outrage. Twenty-four hours later, that outrage was mollified by Israeli firsters in Washington. White House spokesperson John Kirby reversed course, claiming there was no evidence of deliberate targeting—absolving Israel in the same breath that had condemned it. A mass killing became a footnote.

This is nothing new.

In October 2023, nearly 500 civilians were killed in a blast at the Al-Ahli Arab Hospital in Gaza. Israel immediately blamed a misfired Palestinian rocket. Just hours after landing in Tel Aviv, President Joe Biden publicly parroted the Israeli narrative—despite overwhelming eyewitness accounts, growing evidence, and skepticism from independent observers.

And then there is the case of Shireen Abu Akleh, the Palestinian-American journalist gunned down in 2022. Israel initially claimed she was killed by Palestinian crossfire and released a video that was quickly discredited. Yet Western media gave more airtime to Israeli claims than to eyewitness testimony. Months later, under the weight of irrefutable evidence, Israel admitted responsibility—calling it, once again, a “mistake.”

The soldier who murdered a “lesser” U.S. citizen, like other killers of journalists, never faced justice. In fact, he was promoted to Captain and went on killing with impunity—until reports emerged of his death during a battle in Jenin.

Just like the murdered children of Gaza, truth itself has become another collateral damage in Israel’s war of disinformation. And those tasked with defending it—the media and democratic institutions—have too often served instead as marketers and conveyors of Israeli lies and propaganda.

The people of Gaza are not only being starved, bombed, and murdered. They are being erased from global consciousness by a wall of deception. And until the world begins to value Palestinian lives as much as it values Israeli (proven false) narratives, the Israeli theater of blood and deceit will continue.

Israel is not only getting away with war crimes—it’s getting away with lying about them. The impunity is not only military; it is moral, political, and informational. Israel has long mastered the art of the lie, dating back to the creation of political Zionism. The West, and its managed media, has normalised these falsehoods—just as it has normalized the starvation and siege of Gaza.

Israel lies with impunity because the world—especially the United States and much of the West—not only permits it, but promotes it. Western governments and media have built an echo chamber where Israeli narratives always take precedence—not due to credibility, but to avoid the reckoning that truth would demand. In choosing falsehood over fact, they evade moral accountability and sidestep the need to reconcile their professed values with the genocide they enable.

This is no longer just about Israeli lies. It’s about a global system complicit in sustaining Israel’s habitual lies and systematic deceit to cover up a starvation and a livestreamed genocide.

The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Monitor.