Introduction: Contemporary armed conflicts are no longer merely military events but increasingly mediated phenomena in which meaning and public experience are constructed through signs, images, and narratives. Drawing on Jean Baudrillard’s theory of simulation and hyperreality—particularly his argument that “the Gulf War did not take place”—this study examines how media outlets did not simply represent the battlefield realities of the 12-day Iran-Israel war (June 13-25, 2025) but actively produced distinct media realities. Baudrillard argued that, in the media age, representations become detached from their referents and acquire an autonomous existence in which the boundary between reality and simulation becomes increasingly blurred. Building on this perspective, the study asks: How did Iranian, Israeli, and international media construct hyperreality through language, imagery, and narrative reproduction? Which frames dominated each media cluster, and what do the three proposed indices—Self-Referentiality (SR), Narrative Reproduction Rate (NRR), and Narrative-Reality Gap (NRG)—reveal about the relationship between media representations and battlefield realities? The principal contribution of this study lies in translating Baudrillard’s abstract theoretical concepts into measurable analytical indicators, thereby enabling a comparative mixed-methods analysis of media representation during an intensive, short-term armed conflict.
Methods: The study employed a mixed-methods design combining Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) with computational text analysis. The corpus consisted of 150 news headlines (50 from each cluster) collected from three media groups: Iranian state-affiliated media (IRNA, ISNA, Press TV, and Tehran Times), Israeli media (The Jerusalem Post, The Times of Israel, Ynet, and Israel Hayom), and international news organizations (Reuters, Al Jazeera English, France 24, and the Associated Press). The sampling period extended from June 11 to July 1, 2025, covering the conflict together with a two-day pre-war period and a five-day post-ceasefire period. Headlines were selected through purposive sampling using relevance keywords and maximum temporal variation.
Nine analytical frames were identified: Resistance/Heroic Action, Defense/Security, Technological Superiority, Humanitarian Cost, International Legality, Diplomacy/De-escalation, Escalation/Threat, Blame Attribution, and Victory/Minimization of Losses. Each headline could receive multiple frame codes. Three hyperreality indices were calculated: Self-Referentiality (SR), Narrative Reproduction Rate (NRR), and Narrative-Reality Gap (NRG). Independent field reality was defined as facts corroborated by at least two independent and non-aligned sources. Computational analysis was conducted using VOSviewer for keyword co-occurrence networks and Microsoft Excel for descriptive statistical analysis.
Findings: The analysis revealed substantial differences among the three media clusters. Iranian media exhibited the highest Narrative Reproduction Rate (5.4 per day) and the largest Narrative-Reality Gap (27%). Coverage was dominated by the Resistance/Heroic Action frame, emphasizing symbolic victory and martyrdom while minimizing domestic losses. Self-Referentiality was also high (42%), with many reports relying primarily on official statements or previously published domestic media reports.
Israeli media demonstrated a similarly high level of Self-Referentiality (38%) and a Narrative-Reality Gap of 25%. Coverage primarily emphasized Defense/Security and Technological Superiority, highlighting the effectiveness of missile interception systems and deterrence capabilities while downplaying operational failures.
International media showed the lowest Self-Referentiality (21%) and the smallest Narrative-Reality Gap (15%). Their coverage focused predominantly on Humanitarian Cost and Diplomacy/Ceasefire. Nevertheless, this cluster also displayed identifiable narrative patterns by framing the conflict primarily as a humanitarian crisis requiring international management rather than as a sequence of military operations.
Keyword co-occurrence analysis revealed three distinct semantic structures corresponding to the three media clusters. International media were characterized by terms such as civilian, children, casualty, and aid; Israeli media by defense, interception, Iron Dome, and deterrence; and Iranian media by resistance, martyr, victory, and missile. These findings indicate that each media cluster constructed a relatively self-contained hyperreality in which media representations acquired a degree of autonomy from battlefield events.
Conclusion: The findings demonstrate that the 12-day Iran-Israel war unfolded not only on the battlefield but also within competing media narratives. Consistent with Baudrillard’s theory of hyperreality, the examined media outlets did not simply report events but actively constructed mediated realities that shaped public interpretation of the conflict. Iranian media emphasized heroic resistance and symbolic victory, Israeli media foregrounded technological superiority and legitimate self-defense, while international media primarily framed the conflict through humanitarian and diplomatic perspectives.
The three proposed indices—Self-Referentiality, Narrative Reproduction Rate, and Narrative-Reality Gap—proved useful for operationalizing the concept of hyperreality in comparative media research. Nevertheless, the study is subject to several limitations, including the relatively small sample of headlines, the short duration of the conflict examined, and the absence of direct Hebrew-language analysis. Future research should examine the causal effects of hyperreal narratives on audience perceptions, compare conflicts of different durations, and trace the evolution of dominant narratives across traditional media, social media, and user-generated content. Overall, the study highlights the importance of media literacy and transparent journalistic practices in an era in which mediated representations increasingly shape public understandings of armed conflict.