muffle

(verb) Deaden (a sound or noise), especially by wrapping.

Synonyms: mute, tone down, dampen, dull

Usage: I was up past my bedtime, so I tried to muffle my sneeze by holding my pillow over my face.

'Muffle' reminds me of sleeping:)

1: to wrap up so as to conceal or protect : cover over : envelop

<muffling his neck with a knitted scarf — Agatha Christie>
<the cloud … muffled the plane — Ira Wolfert>
<the grey fog which muffled the sky — Ellen Glasgow>
<still drowsy, he muffled his face and went to sleep — C. G. D. Roberts>

2 a obsolete : to prevent from seeing : blindfold

<love, whose view is muffled still, should without eyes see pathways to his will — Shakespeare>

b : to prevent from speaking : silence

<let's muffle all the gossip — Louis Bromfield>

3 a : to wrap or pad with something to dull the sound of

<the rowlocks were muffled in chamois — A. B. Mayse>

b : to deaden the sound of

<muffle the noises of the street — Virginia Woolf>
<the sands … have muffled the tread of countless armies — Rex Keating>

4: to keep down : suppress

<the abrupt, bony, closemouthed prose … muffles his social comment — John Woodburn>
<made an admirable effort to muffle his feelings — Time>

Here in the United States, the media do their best to muffle any criticism of country X.

Country X, we are told, should receive 100% American support.

Any criticism of country X is considered offensive.

All politicians scream at the top of their lungs that they fully support country X and continue to vote billions of dollars of aid to it.