When Genocide Wasn’t News, published by Breach Books, is an indictment on what they call the Canadian media establishment’s failure to report on the genocide in Gaza with the journalistic integrity expected of our institutions.
Released on July 10, 2025 in conjunction with Breach Media, the book argues that Canadian establishment media has systematically downplayed or misrepresented the destruction of Gaza, amounting to a media cover-up of what many experts and journalists now describe as a genocide committed by Israel.
The most honest reporting on Gaza didn’t come from Canadian newsrooms—it came from Palestinian journalists live-streaming under fire, risking and often losing their lives. When Genocide Wasn’t News reminds us that the gatekeepers of Canadian media were not just negligent; they were complicit in constructing a narrative that prioritised Israeli grief while rendering Palestinian death invisible. This book is a scathing indictment of that complicity, but also a testament to the shifting centre of gravity in journalism. It challenges us to ask: who gets to tell the truth when legacy media abdicates its moral and professional responsibilities?
It is a damning media critique, but its real value lies in how it marks the rupture between traditional journalism and the ecosystem of activist, independent media. In its fiercest moments, the book doesn’t just chronicle genocide—it challenges who gets to narrate it.
The overarching argument of this book is that Canadian mainstream media (CBC, Globe and Mail, Toronto Star, National Post, and Postmedia as a whole) have systematically covered up Israel’s large-scale assault on Gaza since October 2023, by distorting facts, omitting historical context, and sanitizing language. This is framed as part of a longstanding structural bias that disproportionately portrays Israel as a victim and Palestinians as aggressors or faceless casualties.
The book’s opening chapters present damning, data-driven evidence of bias. A study of over 6,000 sentences from Canadian newspapers reveals that Palestinian deaths had to reach staggering numbers before they were even mentioned, while Israeli deaths were reported with immediate urgency and emotive language. Terms like “massacre” and “slaughter” were reserved exclusively for Israelis, while Palestinians were anonymous, described passively as having “died,” as though no hand pulled the trigger. This linguistic disparity is not accidental; it is a political act, reinforcing the idea that some lives are worthy of grief and outrage while others are not. The analysis echoes Noam Chomsky and Edward Herman’s concept of “worthy versus unworthy victims,” situating Canadian media firmly within this dynamic.
One of the book’s most powerful sections examines CBC’s editorial policies. In “CBC Says Killing of Palestinians Doesn’t Merit Terms ‘Murderous,’ ‘Brutal’”, the network openly admits to applying strong moral language to Hamas’s October 7 attack while sanitizing Israeli bombings, which it calls “punishing” or “intensive.” CBC’s justification—that aerial bombings are “remote” and less personal—reads less like a journalistic standard than an attempt to rationalize the dehumanization of Palestinians. This isn’t just about bad coverage; it’s about a systemic narrative that portrays Israel’s violence as defensive and Palestinians as perpetual aggressors.
In its final sections, the book turns toward the voices from Gaza and the possibilities for resistance.
A frontline report from Hossam Shabat provides a devastating firsthand account of Israel’s bombardment, illustrating the urgency and human cost of the stories that Canadian media failed to tell.
The concluding chapter, a media advocacy toolkit, encourages readers to actively challenge anti-Palestinian narratives, support independent journalism, and push for a media landscape that prioritises truth and justice over state or corporate interests. Across its 18 chapters, When Genocide Wasn’t News not only indicts the failures of Canadian media but also points to a growing rupture: grassroots and activist-led reporting that continues to redefine who gets to narrate war, resistance, and survival.
It is at its most moving when the book’s narrative shifts from data to testimony. Chapters by journalists such as Molly Schumann and Zahraa Al-Akhrass reveal the emotional toll of working inside Canadian newsrooms during this time. They describe pitches rejected for being “too political,” stories watered down, and editors who refused to use words like “apartheid” despite the term’s use by human rights groups like Amnesty International. These first-hand accounts highlight a core truth: Canadian media is not simply failing to cover Gaza; it is actively protecting the status quo by silencing those who dare to challenge it.
What sets When Genocide Wasn’t News apart from a simple anthology of media criticism is its insistence on looking beyond failure. Throughout its pages, the book documents how independent outlets like The Breach and The Maple have filled the void, amplifying Palestinian voices and pushing back against mainstream narratives. It also acknowledges the role of grassroots reporting from Palestinians in Gaza, who have risked—and often lost—their lives to show the world what Canadian journalists will not. In this way, the book doesn’t just expose legacy media’s moral collapse; it charts the emergence of a new, more accountable form of journalism.
If the book has a weakness, it is that it occasionally leans heavily on anecdotal accounts of newsroom silencing without fully analysing the structural forces, such as advertiser influence and the political economy of Canadian media, that underpin these dynamics. While lobby groups like HonestReporting Canada and Postmedia’s editorial slant are thoroughly examined, the book could have further connected these to broader trends of corporate consolidation and the hollowing out of journalistic independence. That said, this is a minor shortcoming in a work that otherwise offers one of the clearest and most urgent critiques of Canadian media in recent years.
Ultimately, When Genocide Wasn’t News challenges the myth of journalistic neutrality, calls out the dehumanisation at the heart of mainstream coverage, and celebrates the rise of independent voices that refuse to be silenced. For readers of rabble.ca, this book is not just a critique of media failures in Gaza; it is a blueprint for the future of journalism. One that prioritises truth, justice, and humanity over corporate interests and colonial narratives.
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