Washington, Oct. 13 : The White House has gone on the offensive against its critics in the press, singling out Fox News and going so far as to accuse the News Corp.-owned network of waging a "war against Barack Obama".

The offensive comes despite a reported meeting last month between senior Obama adviser David Axelrod and Fox News chairman and chief executive officer Roger Ailes, reports The Telegraph.

According to the paper, Anita Dunn, communications director, has led the offensive.

The unusual White House campaign comes as President Obama faces mounting opposition to his health care reforms, growing concern over the situation in Afghanistan and a continuing general economic malaise.

The President also suffered a setback recently when his personal effort to win approval for Chicago to host the 2016 Olympics was rejected and his Nobel Peace Prize has met with more barbs than bouquets.

Speaking of media magnate Rupert Murdoch''s Fox, Dunn told the Times in an interview published Monday: "We''re going to treat them the way we would treat an opponent, as they are undertaking a war against Barack Obama and the White House, we don''t need to pretend that this is the way that legitimate news organisations behave."

In comments just days earlier to Time magazine, Dunn, a veteran Democratic Party communications strategist who joined the White House in May, denounced Fox as "opinion journalism masquerading as news".

Appearing on CNN on Sunday, Dunn said "the reality of it is that Fox News often operates almost as either the research arm or the communications arm of the Republican Party".

She said the White House would not be a "passive bystander" as opponents try to "tear down the president and his presidency."

"We will push back," she added.

The push back has included a blog post on WhiteHouse. gov in which the White House denounced what it called "Fox lies" and "an attempt to smear the administration''s efforts to win the Olympics for the United States". (ANI)