This is a study of TV new coverage of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and of how this coverage relates to the understanding, beliefs and attitudes of the television audience. The work was undertaken with support from the Economic and Social Research Council whose help we would like to acknowledge. In producing this study out intention was not to ‘monitor’ the media or to criticise individual journalists. Our intention was to discuss the pressures and structures within which they work to show the effects of those on new content and to examine the role of the media in the construction of public knowledge. It is a very extensive study with an audience sample of over 800 people and a detailed analysis of TV news over a two-year period. This work also raises a series of important theoretical issues in mass communications. The main focus of the book is on giving a clear exposition of our methods and results, but the theoretical concerns are latent and there is a more detailed discussion of them in other work by the Media Group. (For a discussion of issues in popular culture and audience response, including the active audience, resistance and post-modern accounts see Philo, G. and Miller, D. Market Killing Pearson / Longman. 2001).
There is a preponderance of official ‘Israeli perspectives’, particularly on BBC 1, where Israelis were interviewed or reported over twice as much as Palestinians. On top of this, US politicians who support Israel were very strongly featured. They appeared more than politicians from any other country and twice as much as those from Britain.
The impression I got (from news) was that the Palestinians had lived around about that area and now they were trying to come back and get some more land for themselves - I didn’t realise they had been driven out of places in wars previously.
Lindsey Hilsum from Channel 4 News also commented on how difficult it was to report in a controversial area:
With a conflict like this, nearly every single fact is disputed, I think ‘Oh God, the Palestinians say this and the Israelis say that…’ I know it’s a question of interpretation so I have to say what both sides think and I think sometimes that stops us from giving the background we should be giving.
The book also examines other factors in production such as lobbying and public relations by both sides.
I had absolutely no idea it was that percentage… I saw them as small embattled and surrounded by hostile Palestinians - that’s entirely thanks to watching the television news.
This is a study of TV new coverage of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and of how this coverage relates to the understanding, beliefs and attitudes of the television audience. The work was undertaken with support from the Economic and Social Research Council whose help we would like to acknowledge. In producing this study out intention was not to ‘monitor’ the media or to criticise individual journalists. Our intention was to discuss the pressures and structures within which they work to show the effects of those on new content and to examine the role of the media in the construction of public knowledge. It is a very extensive study with an audience sample of over 800 people and a detailed analysis of TV news over a two-year period. This work also raises a series of important theoretical issues in mass communications. The main focus of the book is on giving a clear exposition of our methods and results, but the theoretical concerns are latent and there is a more detailed discussion of them in other work by the Media Group. (For a discussion of issues in popular culture and audience response, including the active audience, resistance and post-modern accounts see Philo, G. and Miller, D. 
