US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth appears to have little patience for questions that do not conform to his preferred style of declaring unsubstantiated victories, whether against South Americans or in the Middle East.

In a charged press conference on March 13, Hegseth did more than attack journalists for questioning his unverified claims about the course of the war in the Middle East. He singled out CNN, introducing a troubling dimension to the conversation. “The sooner David Ellison takes over that network, the better,” he said.

Ellison, a close ally of President Donald Trump and a strong supporter of Israel, is widely considered the front-runner to acquire Warner Bros. Discovery, the parent company that owns CNN. If there was any lingering doubt that such acquisitions are driven by political and ideological considerations, Hegseth’s remarks dispelled it.

Such statements reflect a broader shift in how the media is viewed by segments of the US ruling class, particularly under the Trump administration. During both of his presidential terms, Trump has invested much of his public discourse not in unifying the nation but in deploying deeply hostile language against journalists who question his policies, rhetoric, or political conduct.

At this moment, journalists, intellectuals, and people of conscience must speak the truth in all its manifestations, using every available platform and opportunity.

“The fake news media is not my enemy, it is the enemy of the American people,” Trump wrote on Truth Social on February 18, repeating a phrase that has become central to his political lexicon.

Yet American media entered this confrontation with little public trust to begin with, though for reasons that have little to do with Trump’s own political agenda. A 2025 Gallup poll found that only 28% of Americans trust the mass media to report the news fully, accurately, and fairly, one of the lowest levels recorded in recent decades.

Historically, this mistrust has co-existed with Americans’ skepticism toward their government—any government, regardless of political orientation. But what is unfolding today appears qualitatively different. The long-standing alignment between political power, corporate interests, and media narratives now seems to be fracturing under the weight of widespread public distrust.

In Israel, however, the situation takes a different form. Mainstream media often mirrors the militant posture of the government itself, translating political belligerence into broad public support for war—whether in Gaza, Lebanon, Iran, or wherever Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu chooses to expand the battlefield.

Public opinion data illustrates this dynamic clearly. A survey released on March 4 by the Israel Democracy Institute found that 82% of the Israeli public supported the ongoing military campaign against Iran, including 93% of Israeli Jews.

Such figures reflect a media and political environment in which dissenting voices remain marginal and frequently isolated.

“With this kind of media, there’s no point in fighting for a free press, because the media itself is not on the side of freedom,” Israeli journalist Gideon Levy wrote in Haaretz on March 12.

While there is little that can........

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