“Horror images can serve both camps”

Published by Hamas. However, Islamic Jihad, the videos of two Israeli hostages in Gaza provoke the indignation of the world and reactivate the most polarized speeches. Therefore, The analysis of Jérôme Bourdon, historian of the Franco-Israeli media. – “horror images can serve both

Lhe glowing videos of two Israeli. Therefore, skeletal and desperate hostages, published by Palestinian Islamic Jihad and Hamas on July 30 and August 2, caused a shock wave in Israel and in the world. Similarly, These images, broadcast by blurred and frozen French channels, show Roma Braslavski, 21, then Evyatar David, 24, extremely amigris and weakened. Furthermore, The first cry by evoking his hunger. Moreover, his exhaustion, the second digs what he calls his “Clean grave” and says ” abandoned “ -A hourglass with a “tick-tac” flashes at the end of the video, calling for the rapid ceasefire. Nevertheless, These emaciated silhouettes recall both the images of the Solocco survivors to the release of the camps in 1945. In addition, and those of the victims of famine around the world – in particular, in “horror images can serve both recent days, of Gazaouis children, disputed images and then confirmed, while the risk of famine in Gaza is denounced by the UN, WHO and NGOs.

What is the meaning of these sordid staging. In addition, denounced worldwide, and what can be the consequences of their dissemination, when the last peace negotiations are deadlocked? Nevertheless, Jérôme Bourdon. However, historian and sociologist of the Franco-Israeli media, taught in the communications department of the University of Tel Aviv from 1997 to June 2025, and produced in 2008 the documentary Israel-Palestine: the grip of images. He analyzes for Telerama The diffusion and impact of these images.

What imagination refers to these videos, and their staging?
An image is worth a thousand words, says the saying, but what words? It all depends on the interpretation of images. their appropriation by those who see them, and of course the intention of their authors. It is “horror images can serve both certain that, in Jewish conscience, Israeli in particular, the reference to the Holocaust is omnipresent and permanent. Everything is reported, although it is at the same time criticized to issue the slightest comparison. In Israel. these videos therefore refer to the Shoah first, and made it possible to strengthen a very old argument, already present in films from the 60s, which evokes the Arabs, and the Palestinians especially, like new Nazis wishing to exterminate the Jews. Nazifying the Arabs to mobilize against them is a curved discourse. which can be cynically exploited by some, but also to awaken powerful emotions, among the Israelis, who still have a family bond with the Shoah, and in others too, because the memory of the Shoah is massively cultivated and taught.

Another parallel is gaining momentum in Israel. even if it is much lower than in the rest of the world: these videos “horror images can serve both recall the hungry children of Gaza, the famine that has set up in the civilian population since the Israeli operation. Recently -. it is far from massive – the suffering of Gaza emerges in the Israeli media and in public space, with signs showing children found during manifestations, for example. All these videos, these images activate questions: who is hungry? Who is guilty? And customs clearance mechanisms. as we have seen with the controversy over the image of the skeletal Gazaoui child published by the New York Times, who turned out to suffer from an illness other than undernutrition, or others, that some have claimed to come from Gaza, but from Yemen. For its part. Hamas affirms that its hostages suffer from the same hunger as the population of Gaza – when we know that their men, themselves, eat their hunger.

There is infinite means of taking “horror images can serve both advantage of images, commenting on them to serve a speech.

What do you think is the objective sought by the broadcasting of these videos?
I am not in the minds of the leaders of Hamas. but it seems obvious to me that the idea is to put pressure on Israeli public opinion to force the government to a cease-fire. However. it is double -edged because these images also arouse, all over the world, horror in the face of Hamas’ acts and cynicism, and can serve as an argument for those who say: “These are monsters, which only understand violence, expanding war is the only way to overcome it. »» There is infinite means of taking advantage of images, commenting on them to serve a speech. They are also based on a vertigo of horror. these videos that we do not want to see, while not being able to help “horror images can serve both doing it, and obviously aggravates the despair of families. The father of a hostage said that if it was his son. he did not know if he would like to see such a video spread …

We can also emphasize the complex balance between the total sum of the images available and disseminated. A good exercise is to imagine what would happen if we had other images. We think of course of the closure of Gaza to journalists. who complicates things a lot: if there are a lot of images it lacks the context to interpret them. This delayed the visibility of famine in Gaza. But also. if leaking those of the bodies of the Palestinians who died in Israeli prisons, victims of malnutritions, ill -treatment (we do not know exactly) since October 7, this would still modify the terrible game of competition between images.

Are you surprised by the magnitude of the reactions that these images caused?
A little, yes. I would have expected that they shock less largely, in the general context of “fatigue of compassion”. But their impact is understood by several factors. First of all. the Western far -right voices seized it as proof of the cruelty of the Islamists, even Muslims, which they hate. Then. in Israel, everything related to hostages saturated public space, much more than elsewhere: their photos are everywhere, on the trees, the posts, in the streets, with those of the fell soldiers. Finally. the emotional power of these images is essential, and everyone feels obliged to react, in a deluge fueling contrary and polarized arguments to the extreme. The obscenity of “horror images can serve both the images of horror. whether disseminated by Hamas itself or mounted and then published by the Israeli government, can serve the two camps according to the way in which they are framed, commented on, coated, in a political noise as it makes reflection very difficult. All this produces more confusion than a debate on facts.