Prof. Sam Lehman-Wilzig: News Balancing: The Bad, the Good, and the Wonderful
Feeling down about the news? The time is ripe for (re)assessment. With the Iran-Israel war (very hopefully) behind us, on the face of it the picture looks grim: lots of Israeli life lost, and huge destruction of civilian housing and infrastructure. But that’s not the full “reality.” I’ll get to a real evaluation of where Israel is at this juncture – but first, permit me to offer an unusual detour as important background.
You probably didn’t notice, but we just celebrated a somewhat trivial, cultural “anniversary” this week: it’s been exactly fifty years since the huge box-office hit JAWS hit the movie theaters. The ensuing panic about bathing at beaches was over the top. Indeed, to this very day, whenever someone gets bitten by a shark – even as far away as Australia or Hawaii – that incident will be reported, further engendering fear for what should be a very calming experience: swimming at the beach.
Yet billions of people around the world swim in the ocean. So, how many, on average, do you think are killed by a shark every year? Ten! Looking at the U.S. (with its two very long coastlines), during the long “JAWS” era (1970-2000,) exactly 12 people died from a shark attack – that’s a mere one death every two-and-a-half years. By comparison, worldwide, on average, 150 people die annually from… (are you ready?): falling coconuts!!
The point here is the old journalism adage: “if it bleeds, it leads.” Our problem is that human psychology imprints scary (or simply negative) information in our brain far more profoundly than positive news. The reason: our ancestors wouldn’t have survived (and we wouldn’t be here) if they treated possibly “dangerous” stimuli (a tiger sneaking up in the tall, swaying grass) equally to positive info (that grass swinging in the breeze).
But such an approach is no longer functional in modern society with very, very few lethal dangers around. Overreacting emotionally to every piece of “bad” news is not healthy- especially given that such news constitutes a large percentage of contemporary journalistic production (whether in the traditional media or virally spread through social media).
This is not a critique of journalism. After all, as news consumers, we’re the ones “asking for” the negative news. Would you subscribe to a media venue if its usual headline were something like: “Yesterday, 10 Million Israelis Lived Through the Day Without Incident”. I doubt it.
However, this doesn’t mean that we should focus all our attention on negativity. It might take some mental effort but thinking about numerous positive elements (the last 24 hours, or in general), is a much better way of getting through life. To that end, here are a few exercises in positivity dealing with Israel’s current state of affairs.
- Last month, the IDF reported that Israel’s Laser Light anti-drone system was successfully employed against Hezbollah’s drones over the past year or so, with a 100% success rate! At present, this complements the Iron Dome and other such systems (America’s THAAD), but ultimately it will replace most of the others because of its extremely low expense: every firing costs only the electricity used; no physical missiles employed, costing tens of thousands of dollars each.
- Foreign corporations are afraid of investing in Israel? Quite the opposite! So far this year, foreign investment in Israeli companies on the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange is at a five-year high, averaging around NIS 4 billion monthly. Indeed, during the 12-day war with Iran, the Israeli stock market went up!
- In late May, a conference was held in Paris where over 300 European doctors and medical students showed interest in moving to Israel. And this was not an aberration: through 2024 and half of 2025 around 650 doctors from around the world have already immigrated to Israel.
- As reported in The Times of Israel (https://www.timesofisrael.com/israel-tops-list-of-countries-with-highest-self-reported-ai-skills/), “Israel tops the list of countries with the highest concentration of AI talent in the world.” Even more impressive: “Israel takes the first spot for women with a score of 2.95, meaning that female representation in AI-related roles is nearly three times the global average among 87 countries.”
Honestly, how many of these good-news items have you heard about? That’s exactly the point. Indeed, one could even claim that precisely when lots of “bad news” truly exists, we need to balance our outlook with a healthy dose of actual good news – not only because such balance reflects reality but also because such balance contributes to our mental health.
Finally, back to the end of Israel’s war(s). Hezbollah is no longer a threat; neither is Hamas (although we still haven’t reached any closure on that front); the Iranian nuclear program is decimated, and even perhaps eliminated; Syria seeks decent relations with Israel, eventually perhaps even a peace treaty; and the U.S. government remains solidly behind Israel. Not bad for a country on the ropes a mere 21 months ago!
Do serious problems remain for Israel to deal with? Of course! Concentrating on the positives is not a call to ignore the negatives. But it does demand perceptual balance.
“Ups and downs” in life? Absolutely. But there’s a reason that this expression places the “ups” before the “downs.” You don’t have to be a Pollyanna to focus on the better side of our personal and national existence. Just be real.
