The Rush To Believe Hamas And Blame Israel By Much Of The Media Is Appalling

InsightSpencerFernando

How is it that media organizations repeatedly believe propaganda from authoritarian states and terrorists at face value?

Last week, as it became more and more clear that Hamas was launching a horrific terrorist attack against Israel, many news organizations were careful in their reporting.

Many erred on the side of caution, even as social media was flooded with undeniable examples of rampant barbarity and pure evil by Hamas – a genocidal terrorist organization.

And yet, many of those same media institutions decided to immediately take claims by Hamas terrorists at face value, pinning the blame on Israel for the destruction of a hospital in Gaza in what increasingly looks like the result of a rocket fired by Islamist terrorists.

For example, the New York Times was caught repeatedly changing their headline after initially buying into Hamas’ claims without any verification:

Notice how it goes from “Israeli strike kills hundreds,” to “At least 500 dead in strike,” to “At least 500 dead in blast”.

Each time, the story moves further and further away from the initial Hamas claim.

And please note, when you see a statement from the ‘Gaza Ministry of Health,’ you must understand that what that really means is a statement from Hamas. It would be like saying ‘German health authorities’ in 1940, when it really would have been fascist Germany’s propaganda machine.

Many other media outlets jumped on the story pushing the Hamas narrative:

Now, this isn’t to say that the media should have immediately assumed Hamas or other Jihadists were behind the destruction of a hospital. But what they absolutely shouldn’t have done is assume that Hamas – a terrorist organization that lies obsessively in their attempt to destroy Israel – was being honest without verifying the claims.

The Toronto Star made the same mistake, pushing Hamas’ claims as if they were facts:

“As it stands, the IDF is attributing the blast to an Islamic Jihad missile failure. Hamas is attributing it to an airstrike.

Video evidence seems to support the missile failure theory.

By not waiting for facts, the @TorontoStar has failed its duty of objective reporting.”

 

And now, as more evidence emerges, it looks more and more like it was Jihadists who blew up the hospital:

A total failure

Let’s be absolutely clear here. The decision by many media organizations to instantly believe Hamas without waiting for evidence is appalling, and represents a total failure of the press.

And while some may make corrections in the coming hours and days, massive damage has already been done. The Middle East is absolutely incandescent with rage towards Israel and the West, rage that has already derailed a planned summit between U.S. President Joe Biden and Arab leader, and which threatens to engulf the entire region in chaos:

https://twitter.com/officejjsmart/status/1714404151747072408

Of course, Canada’s Foreign Minister appears to be one of the last people to figure out that taking Hamas’ word for it was a horrendous mistake:

All in all, it would seem that a combination of journalistic incompetence, and the tragically deep-seeded anti-Semitism within many media organizations has led the ‘free press’ to deliver a massive propaganda win to Hamas at a time when Israel is fighting for its life against a genocidal enemy.

Spencer Fernando

Photo – Twitter

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