Gulf media do not merely report on Iran; by constantly amplifying the Iranian threat, they shift the Arab gaze from the wound of Palestine to a new form of security anxiety.
What is the main threat in the Middle East: the occupation of Palestine or Iran? The answer to this question is not determined only in the arena of politics; the media also play a role in constructing it. Palestine remains the region’s open moral wound, yet part of the Gulf media, by constantly highlighting Iran, the Strait of Hormuz, the nuclear program, and the military option, is shifting the Arab gaze away from Israeli occupation and war toward a new security anxiety.
Criticising Iran is legitimate, but when Iran is turned into a substitute enemy, the danger is that Palestine will be pushed back not only from the headlines, but from the center of the region’s political conscience.
Palestine is still not merely a political crisis; it is the central moral wound of the Middle East. Occupation, war, blockade, and Israel’s immunity from accountability have turned the Palestinian question into a measure by which justice in the region is judged. Even in international reports, the issues of accountability, justice, and widespread violations of humanitarian law in the occupied territories remain alive and unresolved. A report published within the framework of the United Nations in April 2026 also emphasised the continued serious violations of humanitarian law in Gaza and the need for accountability. For this reason, when the media, instead of focusing on this wound, turn Iran into the center of daily anxiety for the Arab audience, we are not facing a simple shift in news coverage; we are witnessing the gradual transformation of the region’s moral and political priorities.
The power of the media lies not only in publishing news, but in defining the center of fear. When Gulf networks repeatedly narrate Iran through the lens of war, the Strait of Hormuz, the nuclear program, and the military option, they are effectively telling the Arab audience what it should fear most. The result of this process is that Iran gradually moves from being a political issue to becoming a daily anxiety, an anxiety that can take the place of the Palestinian wound in the news agenda and emotional priorities of the Arab world.
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This pattern can be seen in the way news about Iran is republished and amplified. For example, in recent weeks, Al Arabiya has published reports about new US military options against Iran, plans related to the Strait of Hormuz, US-Iran negotiations, and the possibility of a return to war. One Al Arabiya report, citing Axios, said that US Central Command had prepared a plan for a “short and powerful” wave of strikes against Iran. In another report, the same outlet highlighted Iran’s proposal to reopen the Strait of Hormuz and postpone the nuclear agreement. On the surface, such coverage is about developments concerning Iran; at a deeper level, however, it places Iran in a permanent relationship with war, crisis, energy, and regional threat.
In this process, media outlets such as Axios serve as producers of the initial raw material. Axios typically publishes short, exclusive, elite-oriented reports about contacts among Washington, Tel Aviv, Tehran, and regional mediators. For instance, Axios reported on Iran’s new peace plan, the tense Trump-Netanyahu call, and the role of mediators such as Qatar, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and Egypt. In another report, it said that Iran and the United States were moving closer to a one-page memorandum to end the war. Yet the political significance of these reports does not lie only in Axios itself; their importance multiplies when they enter the Arab media cycle and are transformed from diplomatic news into a security warning for the regional audience.
The Strait of Hormuz plays a special role in this process because it turns Iran from a regional issue into a global threat. When Hormuz, oil, shipping, gas, and global trade enter the discussion, the language of the debate shifts from justice, occupation, and accountability to energy security and market stability. Reuters has reported that the Emirati official Anwar Gargash warned about the possibility of a US-Iran agreement and the danger of a return to war, placing Hormuz and its regional consequences at the center of Gulf concerns. Reports about the dispatch of a Qatari delegation to Tehran to help secure a US-Iran agreement also show that Hormuz, war, and the nuclear agreement have become part of a regional and global knot.
The problem is not that Arab media report on Iran; Iran is an important and criticisable actor in the region. Its nuclear program, missile policy, regional presence, and Tehran’s role in files such as Iraq, Lebanon, Yemen, and Syria are all real issues and cannot be ignored. The main problem begins when criticism of Iran turns into the construction of Iran as an absolute threat; a threat meant to take the place of the occupation of Palestine and Israel’s war at the center of Arab anxiety.
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This is precisely the point at which media moves beyond information and enters the realm of agenda re-engineering. If every story about Iran is accompanied by war, missiles, Hormuz, energy, and instability, while stories about Palestine are narrated as repetitive tragedy, humanitarian crisis, or a slow-moving, exhausted issue, the result is clear: Iran appears active, threatening, and urgent; Palestine appears painful, but normalized and manageable. This displacement is dangerous because it turns occupation from the central issue into a familiar background.
The political consequence of this trend benefits Israel.
The more Iran becomes the region’s primary threat, the less Israel is seen as the main source of occupation, war, and moral instability in the Middle East.
In such an environment, instead of asking who occupies Palestine and who supports that occupation, Arab public opinion is repeatedly confronted with other questions: What will Iran do? What will happen to Hormuz? When will the next war begin? How will the energy market react?
For precisely this reason, criticism of Iran must be separated from the substitution of Iran for Palestine. One can criticize Iran’s policies while also refusing to let Palestine be pushed out of the center of the region’s political conscience. One can write about Hormuz, missiles, nuclear issues, and Iran’s regional influence, but these subjects must not be allowed to marginalize Israel’s occupation and immunity. There is a profound difference between criticising a state and manufacturing a substitute enemy to cover a deeper wound.
Ultimately, the issue is not merely media coverage of Iran; it is a struggle over the meaning of the Middle East. Will the region continue to confront the Palestinian question as a measure of political justice, or will security anxiety about Iran take its place? If the media can bury the answer to this question beneath a flood of nuclear, missile, oil, and military news, then Iran will not merely have taken Palestine’s place in the headlines; it will have taken its place in the region’s political conscience as well.
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The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Monitor.
