What’s black and white and re(a)d all over?
Manufactured consent for genocide. Mainstream media parroting lie after lie, serving as an unquestioning mouthpiece for the Israeli government as they murder Palestinian journalists on the ground and silence criticism around the globe.
This conceptual self-portrait was created with about 60 news articles on Israel/Palestine from ten different newspapers printed between October and December 2023 – seven editions of the New York Times, two Los Angeles Times and one Wall Street Journal.
Some editions were chosen specifically for their coverage of certain events: October 7 itself, the “debate” over the attack on Al-Ahli hospital, and the Hamas “mass rape” narrative. I then used all articles related to Israel/Palestine printed in those editions.
Every detail is intentional, from the Starbucks mug to the black dress to the painted kite.
I wanted to include headlines about the attack at Al-Ahli hospital because it was a prime example of how Israel and the media create debates to confuse the public and distract from patterns of Israel’s behavior. So instead of discussing the fact that Israel regularly targets hospitals, medical personnel, any lifeline for Palestinians – all the energy goes into a false debate. Like the Hamas rape accusations, it uses the attention to repeat talking points that instill doubt around the morality, humanity and trustworthiness of Palestinians.
My black dress is a reference to the “woman in the black dress,” the false rape victim featured in the widely debunked New York Times article, “Screams without Words.” Other articles pushing this hoax narrative of systemic rape by Hamas can be seen on the wall, beneath the word “LIARS” painted in blood red.
I felt compelled to address this issue through my art for personal reasons. I am a survivor of multiple sexual assaults, including some with political/ethnic elements. As a former journalist, I am also familiar with the sensitive nature of responsibly reporting on such issues. Furthermore, I am aware of the systemic sexual violence perpetuated by Israelis against Palestinians during the entire history of the occupation and through today. And I too have been subjected to ethnically-targeted strip searches in Israel. Because I know firsthand the difficulty and risk of openly discussing such abuses of power, I do not take these issues lightly – and I do not appreciate when lies are weaponized to justify a genocide committed by a sexually depraved, pathologically lying pariah state.
By now, some international media and the UN are acknowledging that these accusations against Hamas were a lie; even Israeli officials admit there is no evidence as previously claimed. But of course, the damage has been done and Americans continue to repeat the lies, which exploit the politics of the female body in order to paint anyone who questions these lies as evil “rape deniers.” It is important to credit the journalists who have been fearlessly debunking this narrative from the start – in particular, those from The Grayzone, Mondoweiss, The Electronic Intifada, and Zei Squirrel. It means a lot to me that this very piece “Black and white and red all over” was featured on The Grayzone’s stream on March 1, 2024.
“IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH” painted in the upper right corner is a line from George Orwell’s 1984, the Party slogan: “War is Peace, Freedom is Slavery, Ignorance is Strength.” I have incorporated each of these three lines into different pieces over the time of this genocide, totalling four pieces referencing 1984 in a year.
The kite painted in the upper left corner is a symbol for Refaat Alareer, beloved writer and professor from Gaza, who was murdered by Israel in a targeted airstrike on December 6, 2023. His final poem, titled “If I Must Die,” asks the reader to fly a kite so a child in Gaza will see it and think “an angel is there bringing back love.” (This kite is painted over a paid full-page ad of lies, “J’accuse! An open letter to Hamas apologists.”)
Near the center of this piece, I circled the headline of an op-ed by Palestinian-American historian Rashid Khalidi: “How the US has fueled Israel’s decades-long war on Palestinians.” In rare contrast to the generally terrible coverage, I wanted to highlight this piece, because Palestinian journalists are so underrepresented. As shown in a 2020 study by Maha Nassar, only 1.8% of New York Times op-eds from 1970-2019 that discussed Palestinians were written by Palestinians. (https://www.972mag.com/us-media-palestinians/). Meanwhile, journalists of all backgrounds also regularly lose their jobs for criticizing Israel.
To the bottom left beside me, there is a tiny article on the death toll of journalists murdered during this particular genocide, which quickly became the deadliest period ever for journalists. Though of course, the headline “60 journalists killed in Mideast war” does not indicate who is killing who, deliberately targeting Palestinian journalists is one of Israel’s countless war crimes.
The Starbucks mug filled with blood evokes a perverse Instagram vibe – a woman just casually sitting there, in natural lighting, reading the morning paper with her coffee. To me, the Instagram vibe also alludes to Meta’s censorship of information on Palestine. I generated the plain mug with Photoshop’s AI before manually adding details and the Starbucks logo to reference the boycott they have been targeted with after suing their workers’ union for declaring solidarity with Palestinians.
The only headline on the wall that is not directly about Israel/Palestine is the op-ed “In Nagorno-Karabakh, We’ve Seen What the World is Becoming,” which was coincidentally printed below a piece on Israel. The ethnic cleansing of Artsakh/Nagorno-Karabakh by Azerbaijan was finalized in the weeks just before October 7, and is connected to Israel in many ways – supported by Israeli weapons, geopolitically strategic for Israel; meanwhile Israel is ethnically cleansing Armenians from Jerusalem, yet does not recognize our historical genocide – despite exploiting the memory of the Holocuast to justify the existence of their state, as if exercising a monopoly on victimhood. I painted over this op-ed with a large bloody X to reflect the public’s silence and failure to learn from history and current events not so far away.
In my hands, I am holding the Wall Street Journal article, “Is it Time to Retire the Word ‘Genocide’?” and its featured photo of a woman with a sign reading “From the River to the Sea, Palestine Will be Free.” This phrase has been the focus of another debate designed to distract from the actual genocide taking place. While these words for freedom are deemed by Zionists as “genocidal” and “antisemitic,” Israeli officials use similar words to call for an ethnostate. And as for the title of the article, the idea that we should retire the word “genocide” is absurd and, to me, points back to that Israeli monopoly on victimhood.
Finally, the title of my piece “Black and White and Red All Over” was inspired by the popular newspaper riddle that most Americans are likely familiar with, a play on the words “red”/”read”. The newspapers are splattered in red blood. I am sitting in blood as a reference to the false sexual violence narrative, as well as what it enabled. My hands are also dripping in blood – “blood on one’s hands,” a phrase of guilt – blood on the hands of our politicians and media obediently spreading lies, blood on the hands of those who passively consume and perpetuate them, blood on the hands of those who remain silent. The “black and white,” besides the printed newspapers, is also my black dress, the media whitewashing, and the idea that some things really are black and white – clearcut, easy to see. Israeli propaganda portrays the occupation as extremely complicated, which encourages people to stay “neutral” or silent – but it’s actually very black and white.
Overall, this piece took me around two months to prepare and complete. Thank you to everyone who gets it and to everyone who wants to learn.
Minted February 7, 2024. Description updated June 26, 2024.
