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Anti-Israel Media Bias Flares in Martha’s Vineyard Paper
Houses and a welcome sign in Martha’s Vineyard, a Massachusetts island that sits in the Atlantic just south of Cape Cod.
News coverage in the Martha’s Vineyard Times tends to stick to local concerns — labor negotiations between the Steamship Authority and the union that operates the ferry between the island and Cape Cod, the perennial shortage of “affordable” housing for year-round and seasonal workers, shark sightings.
For the past few weeks, though, the Times has been on a campaign against the Martha’s Vineyard Chabad after it hosted a Jewish cultural festival event featuring the singer Matisyahu.
Instead of writing about the festival, the newspaper highlighted a small anti-Israel protest against it. Then it ran another story focusing on a protester-participant, and a third story attacking the festival’s organizer.
One Times news article referred to Israel’s “brutal military campaign” and quoted a protester who said, “We are here to reject the presence of someone who performs and fundraises for the Israeli Occupation Forces and the AIPAC lobbying group, condones violence against the Palestinian people and land in the name of Jewish safety, and denies ongoing genocide.”
The onslaught of hostile coverage has generated a disappointed response from readers.
One of them, Jackie Mendez, took to the newspaper’s comments section. “What is Jewish culture? The MVTimes doesn’t care to explain. Instead, it chooses to give yet more time and space to the ignorance and hatred of Israel,” Mendez wrote. “This newspaper gave editorial space to this kind of rabid Jew-hatred.”
Another reader, Judith Hannan, a former columnist for the Times, wrote in a letter to the editor, “The main issue I think so many of us have is that an event to celebrate a rich and diverse culture, under a literal and metaphorical broad tent, was covered with such bias so the reader walks away with no more understanding of Jewish heritage and culture than they had already.”
The rabbi of Chabad on the Vineyard, Tzvi Alperowitz, wrote in an email to his community that he was disappointed by the coverage. “The Jewish Culture Festival was a tremendous and remarkable community celebration. Close to one thousand people gathered in absolute harmony and unity to proudly celebrate Jewish culture and identity,” Alperowitz wrote. “But instead of a beautiful story about Jewish resilience and celebration in spite of the most tragic year for Jews since the Holocaust, the MV Times cynically chose to paint their coverage of the event through the lens of the few protesters who stood outside.”
Alperowitz continued: “That’s a choice that reflects poorly on the MV Times and its editorial team. Every rational individual can see straight through the piece and understands that it was a cynical use of clickbait to turn a proudly Jewish event into an opinion article bashing Israel.”
Who is in charge at the Martha’s Vineyard Times? The paper was purchased in January of this year by Stephen Bernier, who installed as publisher Charles Sennott. Sennott is a former Middle East bureau chief of the Boston Globe, where he was notorious for the anti-Israel tilt of his coverage. The watchdog organization Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting and Analysis (CAMERA) called Sennott “a virtual spokesman for the Palestinian side,” warning that “under Charles Sennott, the Boston Globe is in danger of reviving its former tradition of blaming Israel first, no matter what the facts.”
Since leaving the Globe, Sennott has been pursuing nonprofit journalism ventures, the latest of which is The GroundTruth Project, where he is listed as the founder and editor-in-chief. The GroundTruth website also lists former New York Times executive editor Dean Baquet as one of its directors, and the Ford Foundation as among its funders.
CAMERA has also been sharply critical of Sennott’s work with the GroundTruth Project. A CAMERA report on a three-part Sennott series attacking Christian Zionism called the work “outrageous” and said it featured “bigoted and sloppy reporting.”
“Sennott indoctrinates young journalists with his long-standing anti-Israel, anti-American, and anti-Evangelical biases,” Dexter Van Zile, then with CAMERA, wrote in a 2019 blog post for the Times of Israel. Van Zile then quoted David Parsons, vice president and senior international spokesperson for the International Christian Embassy in Jerusalem. “There are only two journalists I will never work with again and one of them is Charles Sennott,” Parsons said.
In a Dec. 15, 2023, LinkedIn posting, just weeks before assuming the Martha’s Vineyard Times role, Sennott faulted Israel for deliberately and “with impunity” killing scores of Palestinian and Lebanese journalists. Israel has disclosed evidence that some of the “journalists” were members of Gaza-based terrorist organizations. Sennott’s article, while faulting Israel, also omitted that Hamas restricts the activities of journalists in Gaza, with threats of violence.
I wrote to Sennott asking him whether he is trying to turn the weekly island newspaper into a vehicle for pushing an anti-Israel agenda, or whether there is a conflict in his dual roles at the Martha’s Vineyard Times and at the Ground Truth Project.
So far, I haven’t gotten a reply from him.
Update: Sennott responded to The Algemeiner after press time, and his response will be the subject of a forthcoming column.
Ira Stoll was managing editor of The Forward and North American editor of The Jerusalem Post. His media critique, a regular Algemeiner feature, can be found here.
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Elise Stefanik Blasts UN for ‘Antisemitic’ Report Accusing Israel of Sexual Violence in Gaza
United Nations Ambassador-designate Elise Stefanik spoke at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) on Feb. 22, 2025. Photo: Zach D Roberts/NurPhoto via Reuters Connect
US President Donald Trump’s nominee to serve as the next American ambassador to the United Nations has repudiated a new UN-backed report accusing the Israel Defense Force (IDF) of perpetrating sexual violence against Palestinians in Gaza, lambasting its claims as “antisemitic” and baseless.
“The corrupt UN Human Rights Council’s new baseless report is antisemitic and anti-Israel slander,” US Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-NY) posted on social media on Thursday, when the report was published. “The so-called ‘Human Rights Council’ [UNHRC] has failed to condemn the barbaric atrocities committed by Hamas terrorists against Israel including the brutal slaughter, torture, kidnapping of thousands of innocent civilians, and Hamas’s horrific use of rape and sexual violence against Israeli women and girls, yet disgracefully attacks Israel with unfounded smears.”
Stefanik continued, “This report exposes the disgraceful and obsessive antisemitism of UNHRC and reaffirms why President Trump took the strong, correct decisive executive action to withdraw from it.”
The UN Independent International Commission of Inquiry on Thursday published a report, commissioned by the Human Rights Council, that accused Israel of committing “genocidal acts” and employing sexual violence in Gaza. The report alleged that Israeli military forces have used sexual abuse and forcible stripping as weapons of war against Palestinian civilians.
“Israeli authorities have destroyed in part the reproductive capacity of the Palestinians in Gaza as a group, including by imposing measures intended to prevent births, one of the categories of genocidal acts in the Rome Statute and the Genocide Convention,” the report said.
Upon the report’s release, Israel’s permanent mission to the UN released a statement rejecting the allegations, arguing that they lacked substantiation and were based on uncorroborated sources.
“In a shameless attempt to incriminate the IDF and manufacture the illusion of ‘systematic’ use of [sexual and gender-based violence], the [Commission of Inquiry] deliberately adopts a lower level of corroboration in its report, which allowed it to include information from second-hand single uncorroborated sources,” the mission said.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also repudiated the UNHRC, arguing that the “antisemitic” council has launched unsubstantiated allegations against the Jewish state with the goal of tarnishing its reputation.
“Instead of focusing on the crimes against humanity and war crimes committed by the Hamas terrorist organization in the worst massacre committed against the Jewish people since the Holocaust, the UN is once again choosing to attack Israel with false accusations, including unfounded accusations of sexual violence,” Netanyahu wrote.
In contrast, Hamas, the terrorist group that runs Gaza, said that the report confirmed Israel’s “genocidal” actions within the enclave.
“The UN’s investigation report on Israel’s genocidal acts against the Palestinian people confirms what has happened on the ground: genocide and violations of all humanitarian and legal standards,” Hamas spokesperson Hazem Qassem told AFP.
Several investigations have revealed that Hamas-led Palestinians perpetrated widespread sexual violence against Israeli women and girls not only during their Oct. 7, 2023, invasion of southern Israel but also later against Israeli hostages kidnapped during the onslaught.
Anne Herzberg, legal adviser and UN representative for NGO Monitor, told The Algemeiner that the International Criminal Court and International Court of Justice will likely use the report to bolster their genocide cases against Israel. Other anti-Israel initiatives such as the boycott, divestment, and sanctions movement (BDS) will also likely reference the report in future activities.
Stefanik was tapped by Trump to serve as the ambassador to the United Nations for the current administration. However, Stefanik has not yet been confirmed by the US Senate to serve in the post. Senate Republicans are reportedly slowing her confirmation process due to concerns over the narrow Republican majority in the House of Representatives, where her vote is seen as necessary to pass key legislation.
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Left-Wing US Lawmakers Present New Bill to Implement Arms Embargo on Israel
US Representative Pramila Jayapal (D-WA). Photo by Bryan Olin Dozier/NurPhoto via Reuters Connect
A coalition of 13 progressive US lawmakers has submitted a joint resolution to halt current and future arms sales to Israel, citing what they described as excessive casualties incurred during the war in Gaza.
House Joint Resolution 68 (HJ Res. 68), sponsored by Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-WA), was introduced to the House of Representatives on March 3. The legislation represents the latest attempt by lawmakers critical of Israel’s war effort against the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas in Gaza to prevent the Jewish state from receiving American arms.
Several of the other lawmakers, all Democrats, who signed onto the bill — Reps. Ilhan Omar (D-MN), Rashida Tlaib (D-MI), Gregorio Casar (D-TX), Hank Johnson (D-GA), Summer Lee (D-PA), Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), Marc Pocan (D-WI), Ayanna Pressley (D-MA), Delia Ramirez (D-IL), Nydia Velazquez (D-NY), and Bonnie Watson Coleman (D-NJ) — possess an extensive history of lambasting Israel, falsely accusing the Jewish state of enacting a “genocide” in Gaza against Palestinians and maintaining “apartheid” in the West Bank.
The legislation calls for the US government to ban the sale of high explosive projectiles and artillery shells to Israel. In addition, the bill would bar the US from providing Israel with technical and logistics support services.
In the 17 months following the Hamas-led Oct. 7, 2023, invasion of and massacre across southern Israel, Democratic lawmakers in Washington, DC have grown increasingly critical of the Jewish state. Democrats in Congress have oftentimes lambasted Israel for alleged indiscriminate bombing within Gaza, arguing such military tactics have resulted in excessive civilian deaths.
In December, 17 Democratic senators voted to implement a partial arms embargo against Israel. One of the bills, SJ Res. 111, was spearheaded by prominent Israel critic Sen. Bernie Sanders (D-VT), and would have banned the sale of tank cartridges to Israel. The Senate ultimately rejected the measure by a margin of 79-18. In addition, Sanders presented two other anti-Israel resolutions SJ Res. 113 and SJ Res. 115, which targeted sales of mortar rounds and precision-guided bombs. The Senate declined to advance these bills by a similar margin.
Israel says it has gone to unprecedented lengths to try and avoid civilian casualties in Hamas-ruled Gaza, noting its efforts to evacuate areas before it targets them and to warn residents of impending military operations with leaflets, text messages, and other forms of communication. However, Hamas has in many cases prevented people from leaving, according to the Israeli military.
Another challenge for Israel is Hamas’s widely recognized military strategy of embedding its terrorists within Gaza’s civilian population and commandeering civilian facilities like hospitals, schools, and mosques to run operations, direct attacks, and store weapons.
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Trump Admin Demands on Columbia University Mount as Agents Search Dorm Rooms
Pro-Hamas demonstrators at Columbia University in New York City, US, April 29, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Caitlin Ochs
The Trump administration has told Columbia University that it must make a series of policy changes as a precondition for talks on restoring $400 million in canceled federal contracts and grants, ratcheting up its crackdown on the school and others where anti-Israel protests flourished last year.
The demands, made in a letter dated on Thursday, coincided with a search of two student dormitory rooms by federal agents at the New York City campus, its interim president said. The searches came a week after immigration agents detained Mahmoud Khalil, the leader of last year’s protests at Columbia, in a bid to deport him that so far has been blocked in court.
The developments are the latest signals that the Trump administration has no plans to ease up on efforts to reshape the policies on how US college campuses deal with disruptive protests.
Earlier this week, the Department of Education said it was investigating 60 colleges and universities for allegedly tolerating antisemitic harassment and a hostile environment for Jews. In a related move, it on Friday said it was investigating 45 universities after complaints that the schools engaged with a program designed to increase diversity that set eligibility based on race. It said such activities violated a 1964 civil rights law.
Columbia has emerged as a prime target of the administration, which has accused it of an inadequate response to alleged antisemitism on campus during last year’s weeks-long encampment by activists and a brief occupation of a campus building.
The university has said it has worked to combat antisemitism and other prejudice. At the same time, it has fended off accusations by civil rights groups that it is letting the government erode academia’s free speech protections.
Columbia’s interim president Katrina Armstrong said in a statement on Thursday that agents from the Department of Homeland Security served the university with two warrants signed by a federal magistrate, allowing them to enter and search the student residences. No one was arrested or detained, no items were removed, and no further action was taken, she said.
Even before Khalil’s arrest, students say federal immigration agents had been repeatedly spotted at dorms and student housing around Columbia’s Manhattan campus.
Over the last week, Columbia staff and law students have sent emails and group messages to alert people on campus to the sightings, saying the agents are in plainclothes, and reminding students of their rights.
The campus demonstrations began after an October 2023 attack by the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas on Israel, and the subsequent US-supported Israeli military campaign in Gaza, the Palestinian enclave that Hamas controls. Protesters demanded that university endowments divest from Israeli interests and that the US end military assistance to Israel.
In Thursday’s letter, the Trump administration ordered Columbia to formally define antisemitism, ban the wearing of masks “intended to conceal identity or intimidate,” and to place its Middle Eastern, South Asian, and African Studies departments under “academic receivership,” which would take control out of the hands of their faculties.
A Columbia spokeswoman told the New York Times that the school was reviewing the letter. Reuters could not immediately reach a Columbia representative for comment.
Earlier on Thursday, the school announced that it had meted out a range of punishments – including suspensions, expulsions, and the revocation of degrees – to students who occupied a campus building last spring during the anti-Israel protests. It did not name the students or say how many were disciplined.
The discipline, which followed a months-long investigation, was announced ahead of a Thursday night court filing in which Khalil’s lawyers said the Trump administration’s stated policy of deporting foreign nationals who participate in pro-Hamas protests is unconstitutional. It urged US District Judge Jesse Furman in Manhattan to immediately release him from immigration detention.
Khalil’s deportation was temporarily blocked by a federal judge, and the student leader, who has not been charged with any crime, is being held in a federal facility in Louisiana.
Earlier this week, Justice Department lawyers representing the government said Khalil, 30, was subject to deportation because Secretary of State Marco Rubio had determined that his presence or activities in the country could have “serious adverse foreign policy consequences for the United States.”
The government did not elaborate in court papers on how Khalil could harm US foreign policy. Trump, without evidence, has accused him of supporting Hamas, and Rubio told reporters earlier this week that noncitizen protesters who disrupt campus life should have their visas revoked.
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