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When UPI and the Hamas Press Office Are Indistinguishable
Hamas leader and Oct. 7 pogrom mastermind Yahya Sinwar addressing a rally in Gaza. Photo: Reuters/braheem Abu Mustafa
It’s not often that a mainstream media outlet publishes a piece so full of disinformation that it ridicules itself as a credible news source.
But that’s exactly what UPI did in a piece whose blatant anti-Israeli, pro-terror stance puts the American news agency on a par with the worst propaganda platforms distributing fake news against the Jewish state.
What should have been a short reportage on comments made by Israel’s Defense Minister Yoav Gallant on Hamas’ leader Yahya Sinwar, has been turned by UPI’s Adam Schrader into a glorifying bio of the Gaza terrorist.
It starts with the terminology.
According to UPI, Sinwar — a mass murderer and the mastermind behind the October 7 massacre in southern Israel — is a “Palestinian militia” leader who had been arrested in Israel “for supporting a free Palestine.”
We’ve seen a lot of poor journalism but this from @UPI‘s Adam Schrader is truly an embarrassment.
Let’s start with how Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar was previously arrested for merely “supporting a free Palestine” rather than actual terror activities.
And there’s more. https://t.co/gKPTFOsr7i pic.twitter.com/xXpDxAzav8
— HonestReporting (@HonestReporting) February 19, 2024
While he may support a Palestine free of Jews, Sinwar is most definitely not a militia leader. Hamas is a proscribed terror organization that has ruled all aspects of life in Gaza for almost two decades.
It may be a militia only in Schrader’s romantic imagination, perhaps, picturing Sinwar as some rebel leader in Latin America.
But then comes the disinformation: Israel, according to UPI, was born out of Palestinian bloodshed in a land that has been colonized by “Jewish settlers.”
The militia leader was born in a refugee camp in Khan Younis, then under Egyptian rule, to parents who were forced out of their homes by Jewish settlers during the 1948 war when Israel declared its independence.
The expulsion of around 750,000 Palestinians from their homes came in a campaign known as the Nakba, in which at least a dozen women were raped by Israeli forces and 15,000 other people were killed during a series of massacres.
The “Nakba” was not a deliberate Israeli “campaign” of expulsion as UPI contends. The Palestinian refugee problem was the result of five Arab armies attacking Israel in 1948, while advising Palestinians to leave their homes temporarily until the land was, indeed, free of Jews. The displacement of Palestinians was the direct result of the war.
UPI omits that detail, while accusing Israel of rape in 1948, presumably as a way of excusing or diminishing the very real and systematic Hamas sexual violence against Israeli women on October 7.
Likewise, UPI claims that Hamas has been fighting multiple wars against Israeli “occupation” for the sake of “Palestinian sovereignty.”
Over the years, Hamas has fought multiple wars against Israeli forces occupying Gaza where it remains popular for its stances of Palestinian sovereignty. Hamas has been condemned over the years as a terrorist organization by Israel and the United States.
Did Adam Schrader forget that Israel pulled out of Gaza in 2005 and fought all its wars with Hamas afterwards? Did he not read Hamas’ charter calling for a holy war against the Jews? Has he never listened to the group’s leaders urging an ethnic cleansing of Israel?
Hamas’ priority is not Palestinian sovereignty, but the destruction of the Jewish state.
Finally, Schrader outdoes himself with an appalling attempt to justify Hamas’ October 7 atrocities:
Israel has accused Sinwar of organizing the attack on October 7, which many have characterized as a terror attack. Hamas has blamed the attack on the killing of hundreds of Palestinians and arrest of many more by Israel in the months before the war broke out. Israel had also raided the Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem, one of Islam’s holiest sites.
Does UPI think that October 7 can be characterized as anything other than a genocidal terror attack? And why does it repeat Hamas’ excuses?
Could it be that Schrader is parroting Hamas’ very own English PR document released to the media to justify their massacre? Either way, UPI is effectively using Hamas’ own talking points.
Replete with errors, blatant anti-Israel bias, and some appalling Hamas-inspired justification for the events of October 7, it’s hard to believe a supposedly respectable news agency would publish such a piece.
We have filed a complaint to UPI with the demand that Adam Schrader’s story be reviewed and appropriate measures taken. Unfortunately, such is the state of the piece, its removal may be the only course of action that would rectify the problem.
The author is a contributor to HonestReporting, a Jerusalem-based media watchdog with a focus on antisemitism and anti-Israel bias — where a version of this article first appeared.
The post When UPI and the Hamas Press Office Are Indistinguishable first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Shoah Museum in Rome Acquires Another Defaced Mural of Holocaust Survivor
Edith Bruck, in white, attends the unveiling event for the AleXsandro Palombo mural “The Star of David” at the Shoah Museum in Rome, Italy, on April 7, 2025. Photo: Ariel Nacamulli
The Shoah Museum in Rome unveiled on Monday a second Holocaust-related mural that was recreated and acquired by the institution after being defaced by antisemitic vandals in Milan earlier this year.
The mural, titled “The Star of David,” depicts Italian-Hungarian Holocaust survivor, writer, and poet Edith Bruck, and was created by Italian contemporary artist aleXsandro Palombo. The artwork shows Bruck dressed in striped concentration camp prisoner uniform with an Israeli flag draped over her shoulders. Palombo debuted the mural in Milan in January, in honor of the 80th anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp, but mere days after its unveiling, the large blue Star of David on the Israeli flag was scrapped off by vandals and Bruck’s face with later defaced. Palombo has since recreated the mural, and it is now in display at the Shoah Museum.
In the original mural, Bruck stood under the words “Arbeit macht frei” (“Work makes you free”), which is the phrase featured on the main gate at the site of the former Auschwitz concentration camp. Palombo also named the artwork after the slogan, but he left out the wording when recreating the mural for the Holocaust museum and has renamed the artwork “The Star of David.”
Bruck attended the mural’s unveiling ceremony on Monday at the Shoah Museum. The event was also attended by Israeli Ambassador to Italy Jonathan Peled; Victor Fadlun, president of the Jewish Community of Rome; and Noemi Di Segni, president of the Union of Italian Jewish Communities.
“The mural must live precisely because it was vandalized, and so it will live, and everything related to memory and what I have personally experienced must live,” Bruck said. “After they defaced it, it will finally live, it will live because it has returned to Rome, where I live.”
The artwork has been added to the museum’s permanent collection and it stands beside another of Palombo’s Holocaust-related murals – titled “Anti-Semitism, History Repeating” – which was acquired by the Shoah Museum in January after it was defaced three times. That mural depicted two Auschwitz survivors — Italian Senate member for life Liliana Segre and Italian author Sami Modiano. The two murals are now displayed in front of the Portico d’Ottavia outside the Casina dei Vallati, which is in the ancient Jewish Ghetto of Rome and currently home to the Shoah Museum.
Palombo has had several of his Holocaust-related murals vandalized in antisemitic attacks, including one that features Bruck, Segre and Modiano together.
“After the despicable defacement in Milan, welcoming today aleXsandro Palombo’s mural at the Museum of the Shoah Foundation is an act of resistance and responsibility,” said Mario Venezia, president of the Shoah Museum Foundation. “Edith Bruck, like Liliana Segre and Sami Modiano, has dedicated her life to dialogue and testimony, speaking to thousands of young people and engaging with institutions. Today, we are here to reiterate that memory cannot be erased, neither by paint nor by the hatred of those who attempt to rewrite history. We will continue to defend it, to honor the survivors and for all new generations who believe in the value of knowledge and respect.”
“Edith Bruck came to the inauguration of aleXsandro Palombo’s work to show that we have no intention of accepting these forms of violence, responding in a peaceful, non-violent way,” added Venezia. “It’s important because her gesture is a civil response to an act of vandalism. We have Edith with us, and we will always have her in our hearts and minds.”
The post Shoah Museum in Rome Acquires Another Defaced Mural of Holocaust Survivor first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Yeshiva University Baseball Team Ends 100-Game Losing Streak With Victory Over Bronx’s Lehman College
Yeshiva University David H. Zysman Hall. Photo: Beyond My Ken/Wikimedia Commons
The baseball team of Yeshiva University in New York City on Tuesday night snapped a 100-game losing streak dating back to 2022 when it beat Bronx’s Lehman College in a doubleheader.
The Lehman Lightning team came into Tuesday night’s game at Naimoli Family Baseball Complex in New Jersey with its own 42-game losing streak going back to 2023. YU and Lehman College had the two longest losing streaks in college baseball heading into their showdown.
Lehman was the first to end its losing streak when it won the first game of the night 7-6 with extra innings, which pushed YU’s losing streak from 99 to 100 games. The Maccabees held a 5-4 lead in the top of the fifth inning but ultimately lost to their rivals.
However, the Washington Heights Jewish school came back to put a stop to their streak, and a 0-18 all-time record against Lehman, with a 9-5 victory in the second game of the night. The pitcher who closed out the game, Noah Steinmetz, is the younger brother of Orthodox Jewish Arizona Diamondbacks pitcher Jacob Steinmetz and son of YU’s basketball coach Elliot Steinmetz.
YESHIVA UNIVERSITY WINS! The 100 game losing streak is snapped! pic.twitter.com/vBMCF5pS8o
— Michael Clair (@michaelsclair) April 8, 2025
Only two players on the current roster of the YU Maccabees have ever been on the field before for a win, according to Major League Baseball (MLB). Lehman’s head coach, Chris Delgado, has never led his team to a victory and was a player on the Lehman roster the last time the baseball team won a game, MLB.com noted,
“I really appreciate [the fans who came out],” Delgado reportedly said. “The cold weather was not our best friend today, for the fans and for the players. It’s definitely a sense of relief, and I feel happy for this side and for Yeshiva as well. It’s a long time coming. I feel like it was a successful day for both programs and something both programs needed to be able to move forward from the failures in the past.”
The post Yeshiva University Baseball Team Ends 100-Game Losing Streak With Victory Over Bronx’s Lehman College first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Iranian State Media Boosts Tucker Carlson’s Comments Opposing US Military Action, Condemning ‘Neocons’
Tucker Carlson speaks on July 18, 2024 during the final day of the Republican National Convention at the Fiserv Forum in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Photo: Jasper Colt-USA TODAY via Reuters Connect
Iranian state media boosted recent comments from controversial political commentator Tucker Carlson that suggested an American military confrontation with Iran would be “suicidal” for the US.
The Islamic Republic News Agency (IRNA), the official news agency of the state of Iran, published an article on Tuesday highlighting Carlson’s comments, in which the far-right podcast host and media personality warned the US against prosecuting a “destructive” war with Iran. Carlson cautioned that the US would surely “lose” any military confrontation with the Islamist regime and blamed unspecified “neocons” for suggesting federal lawmakers adopt a more aggressive posture toward Tehran.
“Whatever you think of tariffs, it’s clear that now is the worst possible time for the United States to participate in a military strike on Iran. We can’t afford it. Thousands of Americans would die. We’d lose the war that follows,” Carlson posted on social media.
Carlson then blamed a potential war with Iran on “unrelenting pressure from neocons,” referring to so-called neoconservatives in the US who believe in a more aggressive US foreign and military policy. He also blasted federal officials for allegedly pushing for “”with Iran” and said they are “not an ally of the United States, but an enemy.”
The former Fox News host did not note in his social media post that US officials have long accused Iran of clandestinely pursuing nuclear weapons — a charge denied by Tehran — and labeled the Middle Eastern power as the world’s foremost state sponsor of terrorism.
Tuesday was not the first time that Carlson lambasted US foreign policy toward Iran and its terrorist proxies in the Middle East.
In January 2024, he condemned American military action against the Houthi terrorist group in Yemen as the “next step toward full scale war with Iran, which the foreign policy ghouls in Washington have been fantasizing about for decades.”
In December 2024, Carlson asked on X/Twitter, “Which government has killed more Americans: Iran or Mexico?” in an apparent attempt to advocate a tougher posture against illegal immigration into the US.
Carlson criticized his former employer, Fox News, in March, posting that the network was “softening up the base for a war” with Iran.
Beyond Iran, Carlson has sparked controversy over the past year for spreading misinformation regarding Jewish history and Israel. In September 2024, Carlson drew outrage for platforming Holocaust revisionist and self-described historian Darryl Cooper. During their discussion on his podcast, Cooper appeared to downplay the Holocaust, argued that the US was on the “wrong side” of World War II, and suggested that the slaughter of six million Jews in concentration camps was “humane” because the Nazis did not have food to feed the “prisoners of war.”
In December, Carlson invited economist Jeffrey Sachs onto his podcast for a lengthy interview in which both men gave credence to the antisemitic idea that Israel “controls” US foreign policy, among other controversial comments. During the interview, Sachs floated the notion that former Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s recently toppled regime was largely harmless and that the US opposed the authoritarian ruler “on behalf of Israel.” Sachs argued that American foreign policy hawks and the Israeli government have embarked on a joint mission to “remake the Middle East.”
Carlson has also criticized Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza, repeatedly accusing the Jewish state of “blowing up churches and killing Christians.” He lambasted American Christian political leaders for “not being more critical of the destruction in Gaza.”
The post Iranian State Media Boosts Tucker Carlson’s Comments Opposing US Military Action, Condemning ‘Neocons’ first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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