Halfway into our conversation, Oren Persico makes a startling confession. The veteran Israeli journalist, whose job for the better half of the last two decades has been to monitor his country’s media, doesn’t watch mainstream Israeli news.
“I just can’t do it,” Persico, who has worked as a staff writer for the Israeli media watchdog site The Seventh Eye since 2006, tells me. “It’s depressing and infuriating — it’s propaganda, it’s full of lies. Mostly, it’s a mirror image of the society I live in, and it’s hard for me to break the dissonance between my worldview and my surroundings. I need to maintain my sanity.” Instead of watching, Persico stays abreast by scrolling through news sites, social media, and watching select clips that people send his way……more
