4 ms·

Middle Eastern News Sites Are U.S. Government Propaganda Ops

36 points by robtherobber 6mo ago

ImJamal 6mo ago
This is a bit of a tangent, but do any of you have good news sites which are mostly about the Middle East? I tend to go to Drop Site News, Times of Israel, Haaretz, antiwar.com, and Al Jazeera to get some variety, but would welcome some others.
- fakedang 6mo ago
  Times of Israel is mostly Israeli propaganda, although it's good to get an idea of where the conservative majority Israeli pulse is. Haaretz is often objective by global standards, but is a minority in Israeli media unfortunately. I prefer them to know what's really happening on the ground. Al Jazeera and Middle East Eye are both Qatari funded, and both tend to be biased to the Islamic viewpoint. That being said, Al Jazeera does invite a lot of experts with opposing viewpoints to their channel regularly, in both their English and Arabic versions, which is how they eked out their name as the most trusted and most viewed media source in the Arab world. Other news media like Arab News (Saudi), The National (UAE) and Al Arabiya (Saudi) are largely propaganda machines. You won't even get reliable news on what's happening inside their own countries, forget elsewhere. Sometimes TRT World (Turkey) puts out spicy bits of news that is usually underreported elsewhere, but they're basically the RT of Turkey. Russia Today, in normal times, often presents a very neutral perspective of Middle Eastern news, especially when most of Western news media is biased towards or silent on Israeli actions. In fact, for most of the attacks reported on GCC countries, RT was and is likely still the most accurate of them all. But of course, these aren't normal times, and their service practically acts like Tasnim English version when it comes to news on Iran.
  - jst1fthsdys 6mo ago
    Good to keep in mind that all Israeli media, Haaretz included, are under military censorship. So, yeah, good to get the propaganda pulse, but not much else. Also good to remember the English versions of Israeli sites have the propaganda for the US and diaspora. The Hebrew versions give a clearer picture of the internal messaging.
    - fakedang 6mo ago
      > Also good to remember the English versions of Israeli sites have the propaganda for the US and diaspora. The Hebrew versions give a clearer picture of the internal messaging Yes, this is very important when approaching the region. If you want to get the actual pulse, you have to read from the regional language website. For example, Al Jazeera Arabic is actually very extremist by Western standards, just as Israel Hayom in Hebrew is.
  - _DeadFred_ 6mo ago
    Ryan Grim of Drop Site is a pundit not reporter getting his start as a legislative analyst for the Marijuana Policy Project. Drop Site's publisher is Nika Soon-Shiong daughter of the billionaire owner of the LA Times. She made headlines for claiming her family blocked the LA Times from endorsing Kamala Harris in 2024 to protest the war in Gaza.
  - pseudohadamard 6mo ago
    During the recent events I've occasionally looked at PressTV, https://www.presstv.ir/ https://www.presstv.ir/, to get the other side's view straight from the horse's mouth. Still better than White House press releases, where it's coming from the other end of the horse.
- mef51 6mo ago
  The Guardian has decent coverage in addition to the others people have listed
neaden 6mo ago
I feel like dropping the word "These" from the article headline really changed the meaning. I haven't heard of either of the sites in question here.
- RankingMember 6mo ago
  Yeah, I mean it's still newsworthy, but not nearly as earth-shattering as the headline without "These" makes it seem.
- robtherobber 6mo ago
  Good point. HN automatically strips certain words from the titles and I wasn't snappy enough to catch it on time.
  - HPsquared 6mo ago
    I think you can edit it, as the poster.
    - robtherobber 6mo ago
      Only if it's done in a specific timespan, like 10 minutes or less. After that, it can't be edited any longer.
      - red-iron-pine 6mo ago
        hey dang add a "these"
  - RankingMember 6mo ago
    Huh, didn't realize it did that- weird feature to have if it's automatic imo.
- fakedang 6mo ago
  Asked my friends in both sides of the Gulf and even they haven't heard of these lol. Most likely it's just a shit ton of bot traffic.
jazz9k 6mo ago
[flagged]

36 points by robtherobber 6mo ago

This is a bit of a tangent, but do any of you have good news sites which are mostly about the Middle East? I tend to go to Drop Site News, Times of Israel, Haaretz, antiwar.com, and Al Jazeera to get some variety, but would welcome some others.

fakedang 6mo ago
Times of Israel is mostly Israeli propaganda, although it's good to get an idea of where the conservative majority Israeli pulse is. Haaretz is often objective by global standards, but is a minority in Israeli media unfortunately. I prefer them to know what's really happening on the ground. Al Jazeera and Middle East Eye are both Qatari funded, and both tend to be biased to the Islamic viewpoint. That being said, Al Jazeera does invite a lot of experts with opposing viewpoints to their channel regularly, in both their English and Arabic versions, which is how they eked out their name as the most trusted and most viewed media source in the Arab world. Other news media like Arab News (Saudi), The National (UAE) and Al Arabiya (Saudi) are largely propaganda machines. You won't even get reliable news on what's happening inside their own countries, forget elsewhere. Sometimes TRT World (Turkey) puts out spicy bits of news that is usually underreported elsewhere, but they're basically the RT of Turkey. Russia Today, in normal times, often presents a very neutral perspective of Middle Eastern news, especially when most of Western news media is biased towards or silent on Israeli actions. In fact, for most of the attacks reported on GCC countries, RT was and is likely still the most accurate of them all. But of course, these aren't normal times, and their service practically acts like Tasnim English version when it comes to news on Iran.
- jst1fthsdys 6mo ago
  Good to keep in mind that all Israeli media, Haaretz included, are under military censorship. So, yeah, good to get the propaganda pulse, but not much else. Also good to remember the English versions of Israeli sites have the propaganda for the US and diaspora. The Hebrew versions give a clearer picture of the internal messaging.
  - fakedang 6mo ago
    > Also good to remember the English versions of Israeli sites have the propaganda for the US and diaspora. The Hebrew versions give a clearer picture of the internal messaging Yes, this is very important when approaching the region. If you want to get the actual pulse, you have to read from the regional language website. For example, Al Jazeera Arabic is actually very extremist by Western standards, just as Israel Hayom in Hebrew is.
- _DeadFred_ 6mo ago
  Ryan Grim of Drop Site is a pundit not reporter getting his start as a legislative analyst for the Marijuana Policy Project. Drop Site's publisher is Nika Soon-Shiong daughter of the billionaire owner of the LA Times. She made headlines for claiming her family blocked the LA Times from endorsing Kamala Harris in 2024 to protest the war in Gaza.
- pseudohadamard 6mo ago
  During the recent events I've occasionally looked at PressTV, https://www.presstv.ir/ https://www.presstv.ir/, to get the other side's view straight from the horse's mouth. Still better than White House press releases, where it's coming from the other end of the horse.
mef51 6mo ago
The Guardian has decent coverage in addition to the others people have listed

neaden 6mo ago

I feel like dropping the word "These" from the article headline really changed the meaning. I haven't heard of either of the sites in question here.

RankingMember 6mo ago
Yeah, I mean it's still newsworthy, but not nearly as earth-shattering as the headline without "These" makes it seem.
robtherobber 6mo ago
Good point. HN automatically strips certain words from the titles and I wasn't snappy enough to catch it on time.
- HPsquared 6mo ago
  I think you can edit it, as the poster.
  - robtherobber 6mo ago
    Only if it's done in a specific timespan, like 10 minutes or less. After that, it can't be edited any longer.
    - red-iron-pine 6mo ago
      hey dang add a "these"
- RankingMember 6mo ago
  Huh, didn't realize it did that- weird feature to have if it's automatic imo.
fakedang 6mo ago
Asked my friends in both sides of the Gulf and even they haven't heard of these lol. Most likely it's just a shit ton of bot traffic.

jazz9k 6mo ago

[flagged]