Navigating the Storm of News

Iain Overton on how to remember our humanity when faced with the horrors of global conflicts

Paul Klee’s ‘Angelus Novus’, renamed ‘The Angel of History’ by its first owner, Walter Benjamin. From the collection of the Israel Museum, Jerusalem.

In recent weeks, it has been hard not to be overwhelmed by the news. The deluge of stories – from war, natural disasters, pandemics – has become so loud it seems safer for our mental health to turn away from such trauma. But when images of dead children in Gaza or bombed cities in Ukraine merge with our social media feeds alongside tips on how to grow healthy houseplants or videos of kittens falling over, not only can you not ignore the violence of the world, it risks being normalised. Even, when juxtaposed against fripperies of cute videos and viral posts, of tipping over into becoming a dark form of news-entertainment.

The weight of such news cannot be underestimated. The United Nations said this week more than 10,000 civilians had been killed in Ukraine so far, with far more likely to be recorded, especially in the occupied territories. The Hamas attacks in Israel last month killed some 1,200. Gaza has recorded more than 14,000 dead in Israel's military counter-attack.

Globally, civilians killed from explosive violence around the world, according to English language media reports on specific incidents as captured by Action on Armed Violence (the charity I head up), has increased by 31% in the last 12 months compared to the year before that.

So what can we do when confronted by such unimaginable harm?