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Despite Admitting Past Errors Championing Hamas Propaganda, CNN Continues to Do So
What does it say about the integrity and ethics of a news network that knows what it’s doing is both dishonest and harmful, yet keeps doing it anyway?
That’s the question one must ask of CNN, especially in light of recent reporting by the network.
CNN’s Al-Ahli Hospital Coverage
The first article is a mea culpa written by the network’s Oliver Darcy and published on October 18, 2023 after the network botched coverage of the infamous incident at Al-Ahli Hospital.
After an explosion in the vicinity of the hospital, media outlets quickly accepted the Hamas claim that the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) bombed the hospital and that some 500 Gazans were killed.
As it turned out, none of this was true. The rocket was actually fired by Palestinian terrorists, and killed far less people.
The media outlets had simply amplified Hamas’ propaganda without making any real effort to verify or caution viewers about the lack of credibility of the source. The false narrative given life by media outlets like CNN led to serious diplomatic consequences and riots spread to cities around the world.
Entitled “News outlets in fog of war amid dueling claims on Gaza hospital blast,” Darcy’s mea culpa acknowledged this to some extent. “Reports on serious matters involving civilian deaths carry enormous weight, often resulting in immediate consequences,” the reporter wrote.
“[I]t is of paramount importance for news organizations to remain in a heightened state of vigilance,” he continued, seemingly acknowledging that the network too easily accepted Hamas’s propaganda.
A School for the Displaced, or a School for Terrorism?
This brings us to two recent articles published this month.
One, titled “At least 90 Palestinians killed in Israeli school strike, Gaza officials say,” was authored by CNN’s Irene Nasser, Abeer Salman, Ibrahim Dahman, Mohammed Tawfeeq, Lex Harvey, and Allegra Goodwin.
As with the Al-Ahli Hospital incident, the journalists rushed to repeat the unverified, histrionic, but devoid of detail, claims of officials in the Hamas-run territory.
This time, the Hamas story was that the IDF bombed Al-Taba’een School in Gaza City, allegedly housing displaced Palestinians, killing “at least 90 people.” The article was quickly updated to include a quote from Fares Afana, director of ambulance and emergency in northern Gaza, stating that “All of these people who were targeted were civilians, unarmed children, the elderly, men and women.”
Once again, the network failed to warn its audience about the many reasons to treat these claims with great caution. And, just as with the Ahli Hospital incident, emerging information would end up casting serious doubt on key aspects of the Hamas claims.
Later that day, the IDF provided the names, affiliations, ranks, and pictures of 19 terrorists it said were killed in the strike.
The Israeli military also stated it used three “precision munitions” and provided video footage and imagery showing the scene of the strike, stating the munitions used “could not have caused the damage that corresponds to the casualty reports of the government media office in Gaza.”
This level of detail, provided early enough in the news cycle, gave substantial credibility to the IDF’s side of the story, as it would have enabled any journalist interested in finding the truth to dive deeper in search of evidence to support or contradict the claims.
And as time went on, even more details emerged supporting the IDF’s side of the story.
The military would subsequently state that there was “high probability” that a top Islamic Jihad commander, Ashraf Juda, was also killed in the strike on Al-Taba’een School. Two days later, the IDF would again follow up and provide the details of another 12 terrorists killed in the strike. That brought the total to 31 terrorists (with a high probability of 32 once Ashraf Juda’s death is confirmed) the IDF has specifically identified as having been killed in the strike.
That is, there is far more reason to believe that the story here is of a terrorist organization yet again engaging in human shielding by using schools for military purposes instead of the one advanced by CNN — that the IDF bombed a school serving purely as a shelter for the displaced.
And so, despite Darcy’s October 2023 mea culpa, the network is still failing, in August 2024, to “remain in a heightened state of vigilance.”
Once again, its journalists demonstrate a disturbing proclivity and enthusiasm for giving undeserved credence to the words of genocidal terrorists.
Sinwar the Peacenik?
So it is, also, with the third article, headlined “Hamas leader Sinwar wants a ceasefire deal, mediators say, but Netanyahu’s stance unclear,” authored by Jeremy Diamond.
Diamond weaves a narrative that Yahya Sinwar, the leader of Hamas, wants a ceasefire deal whereas it is Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that is preventing one.
“Nobody knows what Bibi wants,” the article tells us, but “Sinwar wants a ceasefire deal,” the headline proclaims.
Diamond purports to pass on the words of “Egyptian and Qatari mediators,” but any self-respecting journalist should know not to just blindly accept the words of officials who are far from disinterested. Moreover, Diamond preserves the narrative by omitting the piles of evidence that fly in the face of those claims.
Portraying Sinwar as ever the humanitarian seeking an end to the bloodshed, Diamond carefully keeps from his readers Sinwar’s history. The arch-terrorist is widely considered to be the architect of the October 7 atrocities, in which well over a thousand Israelis were murdered, raped, tortured, mutilated, and kidnapped. He is the man who openly bragged over text messages that civilian deaths in Gaza are “necessary sacrifices” and that “[w]e have the Israelis right where we want them.”
It is also widely known, including by CNN itself, that lower level Hamas commanders had been begging Sinwar for months to accept a ceasefire deal, to no avail.
And as with the first two articles, CNN’s narrative is blatantly false, and not just because of the long record of Hamas rejecting ceasefire deals that had Israeli and worldwide support.
Embarrassingly for Diamond, on the same day his apologia for Sinwar was published, Sinwar’s terrorist organization itself upended his entire story by rejecting the invitation of the US, Qatar, and Egypt to attend a final round of negotiations for a ceasefire deal. Netanyahu, notably, had agreed to send negotiators to the talks.
Once again, a CNN journalist finds himself having breathlessly advanced what was clearly false Hamas propaganda.
Consequences for Israel Can’t Be Walked Back
In Darcy’s October mea culpa, the reporter sought to excuse CNN’s failures by depicting them as a consequence of the “fog of war.” But the issue wasn’t that CNN couldn’t be expected to know the precise details; it’s that CNN journalists threw caution to the wind and took the word of terrorists. “Fog of war” means journalists should treat information coming out with great skepticism and carefulness, which is precisely the opposite of what the network did in that instance.
Yet even if we accept Darcy’s excuse, that was ten months ago; professionals should learn from their mistakes.
Instead, CNN reporters are once again negatively, and unjustifiably, affecting the course of events by repeating the exact same errors. The inaccurate coverage of the weekend strike led to numerous diplomatic condemnations of Israel for what increasingly looks like a completely legitimate strike on internationally designated terrorists who were themselves violating the laws of armed conflict. The public relations touch-up for Sinwar, the genocidal terrorist, means diplomatic and public pressure will be placed exactly where it isn’t needed instead of on Hamas, the party holding up a deal to release the Israeli hostages his organization took during its horrific attack last October.
After acknowledging the importance of remaining “in a heightened state of vigilance,” Darcy’s October article continued: “Failing to do so runs the risk of confusing and actively misinforming the public, with warring factions retreating even deeper into their respective corners, pointing fingers at one another, with civilians caught in the middle.”
Clearly, CNN understands that bad journalism not only does a disservice to its audience, but it also puts innocent civilians in danger. So, what are we to make of the fact that these reporters are knowingly repeating the same mistakes?
David M. Litman is a Research Analyst at the Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting and Analysis (CAMERA).
The post Despite Admitting Past Errors Championing Hamas Propaganda, CNN Continues to Do So first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Israel Unveils Its Preemptive Capabilities
Lebanese side of the border with Israel, seen from Tyre, August 25, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Aziz Taher
JNS.org – The Israeli Air Force’s major preemptive strike on Sunday, launched a little before 5 a.m. against Hezbollah positions in Southern Lebanon, was a stinging surprise to the Iranian-backed terror army.
However, despite this important achievement, and the welcome activation of preemptive steps, it is important to remember that the fundamental threat to Israel’s north remains in place.
Both Hezbollah and its Iranian sponsor are likely conducting an extensive situation assessment to gauge the damage that Hezbollah sustained, and to plot their next move. Initial signs are that they wish to end this particular episode and regroup for the next stage of their war on Israel.
According to Lt. Col. Nadav Shoshani, Israel Defense Forces international spokesperson, the operation was a direct response to intelligence indicating that Hezbollah was preparing to launch an extensive missile and rocket attack on northern and central Israel.
The IDF has been closely monitoring Hezbollah and Iran attack capabilities, and remained on the highest state of alert in anticipation of an attack on Israel. For weeks, the Iranian-led Shi’ite radical axis has been threatening to respond to the assassinations of Hezbollah chief of staff Fuad Shukr in Beirut on July 30 and Hamas Political Bureau chief Ismael Haniyeh in Tehran on July 31.
This swift and decisive action by the IDF, involving around 100 fighter jets, targeted thousands of Hezbollah rocket launchers across more than 40 launch areas in southern Lebanon, thwarting what could have been a significant assault on Israel.
Hezbollah was still able to fire hundreds of rockets and unmanned aerial vehicles towards northern Israeli communities on Sunday, but most of its attack was headed off by the IAF’s preemptive move.
Hezbollah’s preparations involved embedding rocket launchers within villages and towns across Southern Lebanon, thereby increasing the risk of collateral damage during any retaliatory strikes.
The IDF, which called Sunday on Lebanese civilians to move away from Hezbollah’s areas of activities, carried out a remarkable operation that not only destroyed a sizeable number of launchers but also proved, at the operational and intelligence level, that Israel is viewing Hezbollah’s activities in real time and can respond quickly to intelligence warnings.
Hezbollah had been preparing to fire rockets and missiles at Israel, with some reports indicating that these were intended to target key strategic locations in central Israel, including security and military installations. Shoshani confirmed that most of Hezbollah’s planned attacks were intended to hit targets in northern Israel, and “some in central Israel.”
More than 7,000 projectiles
Shoshani highlighted that Hezbollah has fired more than 7,000 rockets, missiles and explosive UAVs at Israel since October 2023.
This is a reminder of the intolerable situation in northern Israel created by this Iranian proxy.
Taking advantage of Israel’s two-front conflict and the stretching of its military resources, Hezbollah has been able to turn an entire section of northern Israel a no-go zone for civilians for 10 months. Some 60,000 Israelis remain internally displaced.
For Sunday’s intended attack, it appears that Hezbollah was planning to fire a combination of precision-guided ballistic missiles, UAV swarms and unguided rockets at valuable targets in Israel, such as military targets in the heart of a central Israeli city.
According to the Alma Research and Education Center, Hezbollah has thousands of precision projectiles, including the Iranian-supplied Fateh 110 missiles that have a range of 350 kilometers and which, if fired from Southern Lebanon, can hit central Israel. Altogether, Hezbollah is believed to possess some 250,000 warheads, 150,000 of which are mortar rounds and 65,000 of which are rockets with ranges of up to 80 kilometers.
By demonstrating its willingness and ability to conduct large-scale operations preemptively, Israel sends a clear message to Hezbollah and its patrons in Tehran: Any significant imminent threat to Israeli civilians will be met with preventative force.
The question that remains is how Israel plans on restoring security to its north.
Hezbollah’s deep entrenchment in Southern Lebanon’s Shi’ite community, its conversion of some 200 southern Lebanese villages into bases of attack, and its ideological commitment to representing Iran’s Islamic Revolution all ensure that the threat will persist until Israel decides to deal with it strategically.
The international community also has a role to play in addressing the Iranian/Hezbollah’s jihadist war. Hezbollah and its Iranian patron threaten to drag Lebanon into a broader conflict, with devastating consequences for its civilian population.
The post Israel Unveils Its Preemptive Capabilities first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Nepotism or Normal?
The Titanic at the docks of Southampton. Photo: Wikimedia Commons.
JNS.org – Isn’t it ironic that in our own advanced, enlightened and progressive generation, more murder and mayhem is going on around the world than in ancient and primitive times? Chaos and anarchy reign while wars and terror hotspots dot the global landscape. Are sophisticated moderns really more vicious and violent than the cavemen of old? That’s for another discussion, but it is a sad irony indeed.
Alas, Cowboys and Indians and war movies have nothing on the TV news we watch on our screens daily. Just the other day, 38-year-old Gidon Peri was murdered by a Palestinian who attacked him with a hammer to his head.
Beyond the immediate danger zones lies the risk that we who may be somewhat removed from the battlefields may well become desensitized by the non-stop feed of terror, stabbings and massacres. Our brains are bombarded continuously with wars, murder and violence. There is a very real concern that the constancy of it may well leave us unmoved, inured and almost immunized to bloodshed. We see so much of it regularly that it becomes commonplace and “normal”; our feelings of compassion and sensitivity may be weakening.
We need to reaffirm our abhorrence of violence. We remain a peace-loving people, despite the IDF’s military prowess and our heroic soldiers’ courageous tenacity and commitment to protecting our land and its people.
Over 3,000 years ago, the Jews taught the world about the sanctity of human life. The Ten Commandments and our moral code formed the basis and culture of numerous societies. But there are still too many who deny the sanctity of life and worship death. We taught the value of life to the world, and they have become a death cult, glorifying the ghastly. Is it conceivable in our wildest imaginations that IDF soldiers, or any Jews, would or could have perpetrated a bloodthirsty massacre like Oct. 7? The grisly savagery was so mind-boggling that I struggle to look at the photos.
It is therefore paramount that we, the moral community, exercise the utmost vigilance to maintain our own sensitivity in the face of the visual onslaughts we are exposed to daily.
This brings me to the cynical accusations leveled against us that we Jews do not feel compassion for others. They say we “only care for our own” and do not actually extend our compassion to other people. We don’t care about the innocent men, women and children in Gaza. We only care for our own.
Well, this is but one of the many Big Lies that Jews have had to contend with over the ages. Like all of them, it is wrong, unjustified and utterly absurd. In fact, I can quite easily argue and demonstrate that Jews care more for others than those “others” care for their own. Golda Meir’s famous line comes to mind immediately: “Peace will come when the Arabs love their children more than they hate ours.” How true this remains to this day. Hamas gleefully trains children to become suicide bombers. Little children with machine guns and suicide vests are pictured regularly in their propaganda. This is their “nachas.”
As for Jewish tradition, the Talmud teaches: “We support the non-Jewish poor together with the Jewish poor.” Indeed, we have done so forever. Any objective observer will see it empirically, too.
I remember some years ago meeting the head of the United Jewish Communities of New York when he was here on a visit to South Africa. He told me how proud he was that he managed to persuade a Jewish donor in Manhattan to donate $1 million to Israel. But his pride was shattered when the next morning he read in the New York Times that the very same fellow had just donated $9 million to Columbia University (we won’t discuss Colombia University’s behavior after Oct. 7).
How many American universities, hospitals and other community centers have been supported with massive donations, sponsorships and endowments by Jewish donors? The list is endless.
Then there’s the other guilt-inducing practice that when we hear a tragedy has occurred, G-d forbid, we ask, “Were any Jews involved?” Do we only care about our own? Is it morally correct to even ask that question?
So, please allow me to assuage your guilt.
Let’s imagine you were on the Titanic. You managed to get into a lifeboat and there are people’s heads bobbing up in the water. You can’t possibly save them all from drowning. Then you see your own brother in the water. Would you say it was immoral to offer your brother your outstretched hand first before saving a stranger? Or is that, in fact, the morally correct thing to do?
Is there a moral dilemma here? In my humble opinion: no, not at all.
Charity begins at home. True, we mustn’t only give to our family. We are expected to extend our charity beyond our family to our community, in ever-widening circles if we can. But family does come first. That is a completely correct and appropriate moral duty and obligation.
We Jews are all family. We are sons and daughters of our founding patriarchs and matriarchs, and brothers and sisters literally, traditionally and emotionally. We help the world big time. But we need make no apologies whatsoever for helping our family first.
We fully accept responsibility to help causes beyond our own, but our first obligation is surely to our own brothers and sisters. For this, we have no regrets and no explanations should be necessary.
I am not at all impressed by the world agencies whose job it is to help countries and communities in need. They who claim to be “equal” in their distribution of charity and care to the needy seem to be rather discriminating when it comes to Israel and Jews. When you care “equally” about everyone, it seems you may well end up caring about no one.
So we, Israel and the Jewish people, will continue to be the most moral nation on earth. We shall carry on looking after our own and the rest of the world too.
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Who Are the Anti-Zionist Jews?
Members of extreme anti-Zionist group “Jewish Voice for Peace.” Photo: NGO Monitor.
JNS.org – As a teacher of Zionism, one of the more frequent questions I receive is about anti-Zionist Jews.
Zionism is a modern movement built on age-old values that stand for the right of the Jewish people to determine their future in a state in the Jewish people’s historic homeland—the Land of Israel. Zionists maintain that the denial of these rights is antisemitic by nature because it advocates for discriminating against the Jewish people. But I am often asked: If there are anti-Zionist Jews, how can anti-Zionism be considered antisemitism?
The question isn’t without merit, but it assumes that Jews can’t express antisemitic viewpoints or be antisemitic in general. While antisemitic Jews are an odd phenomenon, there’s no reason they can’t exist. At the same time, there are Jews who agree with the values of Zionism but maintain that Zionism’s goal of establishing a Jewish state should not have been pursued at this time due to ancillary reasons having nothing to do with Zionist values.
Jewish opponents of Zionism have diverse views, but there are three main categories of anti-Zionist Jews: 1) Jews who promote a more assimilationist position and are concerned that Zionism can bring on charges of dual loyalty and increase antisemitism. 2) Jews who are fearful of fighting for Jewish rights. They prefer an existence that doesn’t advocate for change and are satisfied with a less-than-ideal reality rather than one that could better their standing in the world. 3) Torah-observant Jews who maintain that Zionism is inconsistent with Torah values either because of its secularism or its timing before a Messianic era.
In his book Arc of a Covenant, Walter Russell Mead wrote: “In 1919, 31 of the most influential Jews in America, led by the former ambassador to the Ottoman Empire, Henry Morgenthau, presented a petition to Woodrow Wilson as he left for the Paris Peace Conference requesting him to oppose the Balfour Declaration: ‘We do not wish to see Palestine, either now or at any time in the future, organized as a Jewish State.’”
These Jews preferred living in a non-Jewish state with Jews who aspired to be more like their non-Jewish neighbors than in their own independent nation.
Many of these Jews exist today, yet an interesting phenomenon has developed with this group. Those who call themselves Zionists but practice a life that is more like the non-Jews around them than the independent Jewish lives of those in Israel. Mead wrote: “Herzl expected an unfavorable response to his [Zionist] pamphlet, and the Jews of Vienna did not disappoint him. A few weeks after publication, Herzl noted in his diary that “The Jews of the upper-class, educated circles … are horrified by me.”
It was not just that the idea of a Jewish “return” to a homeland where no Jewish state had existed for almost 2,000 years struck most sensible Jews as a fantasy rather than as a serious political proposal; it was that most Western Jews had long ago renounced the idea that the Jews were a nation. They thought of Jews as a race of people sharing a common descent or as a religious community.
Every society and community includes individuals who prefer to be viewed with favor of those around them rather than fight for their own rights and independence. They either fear independence and change or are frightened to stand up for their own rights.
Early Zionists denigrated the Jews in their community who acted this way as “Galus Jews” or “Weak-kneed Jews.” The Zionist ethos holds that Jews should stand up for themselves and demand that the nations of the world grant the Jewish people the rights all nations enjoy. Zionist Jews wouldn’t stand for the anti-Zionist Jews who were afraid to stand up for themselves and demand what rightfully belonged to the Jewish people.
Rav Chaim Soloveitchik, a Rabbi who lived at the turn of the 20th century, once said: “The Zionists attract Jews to their movement by dressing it up as ‘the mitzvah of settling in Eretz Yisroel.” Rav Chaim likened Zionists to sane people who had drunk from a poisonous well that caused them to become insane and try to convince the sane people that they are, in fact, insane. His main objection to Zionism was its move away from complete devotion to the observance of Halachah. Other rabbis maintain that Jews are prohibited from governing the Land of Israel until the Messianic era.
Dr. Theodore Herzl and Rav Chaim Soloveitchik lived at the same time. They couldn’t have been more different. Yet both revolutionized the Jewish world. Dr. Herzl’s Zionism created the State of Israel and Rav Chaim created the Brisker Derech (methodology of analysis).
As a self-declared Brisker, I don’t feel comfortable critiquing Rav Chaim’s position and prefer Rabbi Aaron Zimmer’s explanation of Rav Chaim’s position on Zionism.
In psychology, learned helplessness is a state that occurs after a person has experienced a stressful situation repeatedly. They believe that they are unable to control or change the situation, so they do not try, even when opportunities for change are available. For over 2,000 years, the Jewish people had learned helplessness and assumed they couldn’t return to Israel without a Divine command leading to the Messianic era.
Dr. Herzl, a journalist and man of the world, witnessed the political reality around him changing. He understood that the global community’s focus on liberation and move away from colonialism set the ideal conditions for the Jewish people to return to their homeland and establish their own state.
Rav Chaim and many rabbis opposed to Zionism weren’t aware of global trends and couldn’t see that the time had come to return to the Land of Israel. They saw Zionism as a movement bent on veering Jews away from the Torah with false promises of a return to Zion.
Dr. Herzl was able to take advantage of global trends and actualize the 2,000-year-old dream of the Jewish people to return to the Land of Israel.
The existence of anti-Zionist Jews troubles the Zionist community for numerous reasons, but most of all because they provide support for the antisemites of the world who mask their Jew-hatred with the “legitimate” veneer of anti-Zionism.
Anti-Zionist Jews exist on the fringes of Judaism and aren’t representative of today’s mainstream Jewish community, which overwhelmingly identifies as Zionist and supports the State of Israel. They should be given as much credence as racist black people and self-hating Catholics.
Those who point to the anti-Zionist fringes of the Jewish community and play them off as mainstream to legitimize their hate reveal themselves as antisemites.
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