Palestinian female ‘suicide bombers’ and the masculinity of martyrdom: Comparing ‘scandalous subwomen’ reactions in British and American broadcast news media coverage of the Second Intifada

Abstract

From grassroots activism to armed combatants, Palestinian females have been active in combating Israel’s occupation of Palestine since the early twentieth century. During the second Palestinian Intifada, however, western news media coverage of female-perpetrated ‘suicide bombings’ sensationalized these previously unseen acts. Utilizing Herjeet Marway’s ‘scandalous subwomen’ societal reaction as a framework, this article engages in a multimodal analysis of the largely unexplored UK and US broadcast news coverage of female-perpetrated Palestinian ‘suicide bombings’. Via a postcolonial perspective, it addresses this framework’s focus upon ‘exclusion’: the projection that Palestinian female suicide bombers’ political participation is subject to male influence. This article finds that exclusionary male figures, as well as Saudi Arabia, are framed by UK and US broadcast news media to afford Palestinian female suicide bombers a lack of political agency. Palestinian female ‘suicide bombers’, as a result, become victimized figures via the UK and US broadcast news media’s orientalist ‘perceived reality’ which fails to recognize these female actors’ agential will or their ability to freely participate in political acts.