{"id":8112,"date":"2026-03-04T11:23:36","date_gmt":"2026-03-04T10:23:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/fokusisrael.ch\/nicht-kategorisiert\/israel-coverage-on-srf-one-sidedness-is-the-program\/"},"modified":"2026-03-04T11:57:33","modified_gmt":"2026-03-04T10:57:33","slug":"israel-coverage-on-srf-one-sidedness-is-the-program","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/fokusisrael.ch\/en\/news-en\/israel-coverage-on-srf-one-sidedness-is-the-program\/","title":{"rendered":"Israel coverage on SRF: One-sidedness is the program"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

“Relying solely on violence!” – is how SRF radio editor Anna Trechsel summarizes Israel’s strategy since 2023 in a new report by the public broadcaster. An analysis of events in the Middle East over the last two and a half years shows This claim is false. BEL <\/strong><\/p>\n\n

SRF’s reporting on Israel is controversial and also an ongoing topic on FokusIsrael.ch. And for good reason: it constantly oscillates between incomplete reporting, inaccuracies and fake news. This is no coincidence: in several reports in recent months, SRF has relied on information from the Hamas authorities in Gaza without making their propagandistic nature transparent. There has been no systematic cross-checking with independent sources. There are only two explanations for this: Either the SRF correspondents are doing this deliberately to put Israel in a bad light. Or they lack in-depth knowledge of events in the Middle East. Tertium non datur. <\/p>\n\n

Despite repeated complaints and well-founded criticism, SRF has not yet substantially improved the quality of its Middle East reporting.<\/p>\n\n

A recent example in the long list of problematic articles: On March 1, 2026, one day after the US-Israeli military strikes against Iran, which eliminated parts of the Iranian leadership including Khamenei, SRF foreign editor Anna Trechsel publishes a so-called “analysis”. This term alone is misleading, because a serious analysis sheds light on the background, explains causes, establishes correlations and classifies developments based on facts. This is exactly what is largely missing here.<\/a><\/p>\n\n

Particularly striking is the claim: “Israel has relied solely on force in the last two and a half years. The Netanyahu government has made no attempt to turn its military successes into political ones.”<\/strong><\/p>\n\n

The phrase ‘solely by force’ is a total assertion. It implies the complete absence of diplomatic or political activities by Israel. This assertion does not stand up to scrutiny. <\/p>\n\n

Trechsel omits a whole series of documented diplomatic initiatives and negotiations by the Jewish state that ran parallel to the military operations. Whether these initiatives were strategically coherent or politically successful is debatable. However, their mere fact refutes Trechsel’s assertion of an exclusively military approach. Moreover, the foreign editor has no way of knowing what is being negotiated behind the scenes. <\/p>\n\n

Since the terrorist attack by Hamas on 7 October 2023, Israel has achieved considerable military successes in the subsequent wars in Gaza against Hamas and in Lebanon against the terrorist organization Hezbollah and has eliminated all the leaders of these two most dangerous terrorist organizations. However, there were also numerous activities on the diplomatic stage during this time. <\/p>\n\n

1. hostage negotiations and ceasefires<\/strong><\/p>\n\n

Israel was involved in several rounds of negotiations on hostages and ceasefires, mediated by Qatar, Egypt and the USA. By October 2025, 168 of the 251 Israeli hostages had been released alive and the bodies of the hostages who had been killed had been repatriated – often in exchange for Palestinian prisoners. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu repeatedly emphasized that only military pressure made this progress possible. Nevertheless, the government actively negotiated – e.g. on a US-backed plan in February 2024. <\/p>\n\n

2nd Trump peace plan for Gaza (20-point plan, 2025)<\/strong><\/p>\n\n

In the fall of 2025, US President Trump presented a comprehensive 20-point peace plan<\/a> for Gaza, which included hostage releases, disarmament of Hamas, amnesty for cooperating fighters and a political restructuring of Gaza. Netanyahu met several times with US envoys such as Steve Witkoff to discuss the plan. Israel finally accepted the plan. Its first phase has already been implemented. The second phase is now underway and has stalled due to Hamas’ refusal to hand over its weapons. Israel has so far fully complied with the obligations set out in the plan. <\/p>\n\n

3. regional normalization and Abraham Accords<\/strong><\/p>\n\n

a. Despite the conflict, Netanyahu sought to turn military successes into broader diplomatic gains, e.g. by extending the Abraham Accords. Negotiations with Saudi Arabia continued, even if the Gaza war hampered them (Saudi Arabia paused talks in October 2023, but later resumed them). Netanyahu argued that normalization with Arab states would harm Palestinian causes and strengthen Israel. <\/p>\n\n

b. Meetings with US officials, including President Trump and senators, aimed at a “new security architecture” that combines Israeli and Gulf Arab resources to counter extremism and contain Iran<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n

4. plans for the “Day After” in Gaza<\/strong><\/p>\n\n

a. Prime Minister Netanyahu published a document “The Day After Hamas” two years ago, in February 2024. It provided for the demilitarization of Gaza, denazification and civilian administration by local clans and was thus an attempt to transform military control into a political structure. Netanyahu later accepted President Donald Trump’s 20-point peace plan and the UN resolution (2803) that legitimized it. <\/p>\n\n

b. The Israeli government discussed alternatives for Gaza such as an IDF administration or cooperation with the Palestinian Authority (PA). Netanyahu rejected the latter in order to maintain his coalition<\/a>. <\/p>\n\n

5. international and regional mediation<\/strong><\/p>\n\n

a. Israel was involved in mediation attempts against Hezbollah, e.g. through US and French initiatives to avoid an all-out war in Lebanon. Netanyahu favored diplomatic solutions to the northern border conflict while exerting military pressure. <\/p>\n\n

b. The Gaza war led to diplomatic crises (e.g. with Brazil, the EU and the UN), but Israel engaged in UN debates and bilateral talks to defend its position.<\/p>\n\n

The “analysis” by SRF foreign editor Anna Trechsel completely ignores all these documented diplomatic processes and paints a distorted picture of Israeli politics. This contradicts basic journalistic standards: completeness, balance, factual accuracy.However, SRF’s core problem lies deeper: with the SRF management. It clearly does not have effective check-and-balance mechanisms and proper quality control. Incomplete, erroneous and demonstrably one-sided reporting has no tangible consequences for those responsible. <\/p>\n\n

Or, in the case of the Swiss public broadcaster SRF, anything goes as long as it is against Israel. This is the more likely reason for the biased reporting against Israel. Because the head of Radio SRF’s foreign desk – and therefore Anna Trechsel’s boss – is Susanne Brunner. She has already been criticized by the ombudsman’s office of SRG Deutschschweiz<\/a> for her one-sided anti-Israeli radio reports. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“Relying solely on violence!” – is how SRF radio editor Anna Trechsel summarizes Israel’s strategy since 2023 in a new report by the public broadcaster. An analysis of events in the Middle East over the last two and a half years shows This claim is false. BEL SRF’s reporting on Israel is controversial and also […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":8113,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_hide_socialbar":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[823],"tags":[2599,2977,864,2981,1799,643,689,2980,668,654,2984,2983,1392,825,916,1091,2982,2976,873,2975,2979,2978],"class_list":["post-8112","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-en","tag-abraham-accords","tag-anna-trechsel","tag-donald-trump-en","tag-gaza-peace-plan","tag-gaza-war","tag-hamas-en","tag-hezbollah-en","tag-hostage-negotiations","tag-iran-en","tag-israel-en","tag-journalism-switzerland","tag-media-bias","tag-media-criticism","tag-middle-east-conflict","tag-october-7-2023","tag-own-analyses","tag-public-service-media","tag-reporting-on-israel","tag-saudi-arabia","tag-srf","tag-susanne-brunner","tag-swiss-radio-and-television"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/fokusisrael.ch\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8112","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/fokusisrael.ch\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/fokusisrael.ch\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fokusisrael.ch\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fokusisrael.ch\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8112"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/fokusisrael.ch\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8112\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8126,"href":"https:\/\/fokusisrael.ch\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8112\/revisions\/8126"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fokusisrael.ch\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8113"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/fokusisrael.ch\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8112"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fokusisrael.ch\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8112"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fokusisrael.ch\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8112"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}