The Simulation of Modern Conflicts: Disentangling Hyperreality and “Fake News” in the Ukrainian and Palestinian Contexts

Like the Persian Gulf War before it, the Russia-Ukraine war is happening in real-time on the ground, but also on social media. The reality seems undeniable. And yet, concerning Baudrillard’s definitions of simulacra and simulation, we have never been further from the reality of war. This is evident via echoing accusations of propaganda and media bias, which indicate the slippage of a normative reality. The debates and hysteria surrounding disinformation, misinformation, fake news, and the like have abounded since the beginning of the conflict in early 2022. This has only escalated after the onset of the Israeli-Palestinian war in October 2023. Informed by Baudrillard’s theory and a grounded theory methodology, this paper investigates how scholars have recently deployed Baudrillard’s theories as relates to two specific contexts, the asymmetrical conflicts in Ukraine and Israel-Palestine. If Baudrillard proclaimed the Gulf War did not take place, then how does his analysis of embedded reporting connect with these two contemporary wars? It is increasingly urgent to understand how representations of conflict impact our collective sense of reality.