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Big Surprise: The Media Uses Its Platform to Side with Iran’s Terrorist Regime Over Israel

Firefighters work at the scene of a damaged building in the aftermath of Israeli strikes, in Tehran, Iran, June 13, 2025. Photo: Majid Asgaripour/WANA (West Asia News Agency) via REUTERS

Below is a troubling timetable of how the media reported the first few days of the war between Israel and Iran:

Thursday, June 12 – Friday, June 13: A Multi-Pronged Assault to Cripple Iran’s Nuclear Program

In the early hours of Friday, June 13, Israel launched Operation Rising Lion, a sweeping, coordinated offensive against Iran’s nuclear infrastructure and the officials overseeing it.

The operation marked a decisive move against the Islamic Republic’s military capabilities, unfolding as a bold, surgical campaign whose execution appears to have been years in the making, with final preparations reportedly completed during the past eight months.

The IDF, Mossad, and Israel’s defense industries collaborated on a meticulously synchronized, three-pronged assault deep inside Iranian territory.

In the hours before the strike, the global media fixated on rising tensions following a damning report from the UN’s International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), confirming Iran’s violation of key non-proliferation obligations. In defiance, Tehran responded not with restraint, but with escalation, announcing a new uranium enrichment facility and the activation of advanced centrifuges designed to accelerate weapons-grade production.

Despite Israel’s patience and precautions and Iran’s brazenness, much of the international media framed Israel’s actions as destabilizing.

Media Briefings, Misdirection, and a Green Light

The media’s false judgment of Israel relied on reports that President Donald Trump had urged Israeli restraint in the days leading up to the assault, preferring renewed nuclear diplomacy.

CNN reported that Trump had warned Prime Minister Netanyahu to “stop Iran threats,” claiming the US was “ramping up pressure” on Israel to hold off on any military action.

The New York Times echoed this, framing Israel as “ready to attack Iran” in a move that could, they claimed, “further inflame” the region and derail US diplomacy.

The Washington Post ran with the headline “Fears of an Israeli Strike on Iran,” citing unnamed US intelligence officials who were “increasingly concerned” that Israel would act “without the consent of the United States,” a move they claimed would doom diplomatic efforts and provoke Iranian retaliation against US assets in the region.

Oddly, those same outlets also reported Iranian threats, including a warning by Defense Minister Aziz Nasirzadeh that it could strike US bases if talks collapsed — yet these were treated with far less alarm.

What none of the reporting made clear at the time, but has since been confirmed, is that these supposed leaks and briefings about US reluctance were part of a coordinated misdirection campaign designed to mislead Tehran.

In an interview with Reuters on Friday, President Trump pulled back the curtain: “We knew everything,” he said, calling the Israeli strikes “excellent” and “very successful.” Israeli officials confirmed the US had been briefed in advance and had given quiet approval, though it withheld direct military support.

Friday, June 13: Media Cries “Rogue Israel” Before Iran Responds by Targeting Civilians

Despite the confirmation from Trump, much of the media clung to the narrative of a defiant, unilateral Israel.

CNN’s Kevin Liptak, for example, published an analysis claiming Israel had “ignored direct warnings” from Trump and acted without US involvement, describing the strikes as “against the president’s publicly stated wishes.” The irony, of course, is that these “publicly stated wishes” were never meant to reflect the truth — they were part of the ruse. Liptak, like many others, appeared to mistake strategic misdirection for a diplomatic breakdown.

The Conversation published a breathless analysis accusing Israel of “defying Trump” and “risking a major war.” One is left to wonder: what exactly does The Conversation consider a risk? Iran stockpiling enriched uranium, threatening regional annihilation, and publicly vowing to strike Israel apparently doesn’t meet their threshold. Only Israel’s preemptive attempt to stop it does.

Bloomberg took a similar line, claiming Israel had “expressly disregarded the wishes of Trump” — even as Trump himself, just hours later, confirmed US foreknowledge and praised the mission’s success.

At approximately 9:00 p.m. Friday, Iran responded, not with a measured military reply, but with indiscriminate missile barrages targeting civilian centers.

And yet, media coverage remained locked on the same refrain: that Israel was the destabilizing party, even as missiles rained down on apartment buildings, while the regime responsible for launching them was portrayed as merely the victim of someone else’s war.

Saturday, June 14 – Sunday, June 15: Israel Continues, and Iranian Missiles Kill More Civilians

Operation Rising Lion continued through Saturday, with US officials reportedly assessing the strike on Iran’s Natanz nuclear facility as “extremely effective.” On June 14, Israel expanded its campaign, targeting weapons sites and critical energy infrastructure, aiming to degrade Iran’s ability to fund, fuel, and sustain its nuclear and military operations.

Once again, the Iranian regime responded not with military countermeasures, but with another wave of indiscriminate missile attacks on Israeli population centers — Bat Yam, Rishon Lezion, and Haifa.

And yet, this simple fact — this fundamental asymmetry — has been ignored, downplayed, or erased by many in the global media.

This is not a war between two belligerent nations targeting one another’s cities. It is a preemptive strike by a democracy against the world’s most prolific state sponsor of terrorism, and the inevitable response from that regime: the mass targeting of Israeli civilians, just as it has always promised to do.

The New York Times, which has devoted entire front pages to Gazan casualty figures, often sourced solely from Hamas, could not find space for a single headline acknowledging Israeli deaths. Not one. An entire homepage dedicated to the war, and no room for Israeli victims.

The Washington Post, The Guardian, and wire services like AFP have leaned heavily on the language of equivalency — describing “trading strikes,” “tit-for-tat attacks,” and an “exchange of missiles.”

What they omit is that one side (Israel) is striking military targets. The other (Iran) is deliberately targeting children in their homes.

The Guardian even speculated that Israel might expand its operations “beyond” the nuclear program, ignoring that Israel has been transparent about its objectives and precise in how it has carried them out.

Newsweek accused Israel of “escalating” the conflict for conducting precision strikes on underground nuclear facilities and weapons depots — but didn’t say anything about Iran, which launched ballistic missiles at apartment buildings.

The Context Matters

Yes, Israel struck first –but this was a preemptive strike against a regime that has made no secret of its ambition to destroy the Jewish State.

Just two days before Israel acted, the United Nations confirmed Iran was violating its nuclear obligations and moving closer to weapons-grade enrichment. Tehran responded by threatening to attack US forces in the region.

This is the same regime that funds and arms terrorist proxies across the Middle East: Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Houthis — all of which have escalated attacks on Israel since October 7, 2023, and all of which are also openly committed to Israel’s destruction.

It is also the same regime that has targeted Western civilians. In 2022, the head of the UK’s MI5 revealed that British authorities had foiled more than 20 Iranian-backed plots targeting UK citizens. These plots, he said, frequently involved Iran’s use of international criminals as proxies — a tactic seen across Europe.

The Bottom Line

This war was not inevitable. It was engineered by a regime that has spent decades plotting Israel’s destruction, funding terror across the region, and defying every international safeguard against nuclear proliferation.

Israel’s strike was not reckless. It was necessary, strategic, and aimed entirely at military infrastructure and personnel. Iran’s response, true to form, has been to fire missiles indiscriminately at Israeli civilian centers.

Yet much of the global news media has recast this as a clash between moral equals, drawing a false equivalence that erases the line between aggression and defense, between terrorism and counterterrorism.

The world’s most dangerous regime is watching closely to see whether its atrocities will be condemned or excused. And thanks to most of the media, it may already have its answer.

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 Big Surprise: The Media Uses Its Platform to Side with Iran’s Terrorist Regime Over Israel first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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US Clamps Sanctions on Israel-bashing UN Rights Monitor Albanese

Francesca Albanese, UN special rapporteur on human rights in the Palestinian territories, attends a side event during the Human Rights Council at the United Nations in Geneva, Switzerland, March 26, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Denis Balibouse

The Trump administration has imposed sweeping sanctions against Francesca Albanese, the United Nations Special Rapporteur for the Occupied Palestinian Territories, citing the UN official’s lengthy record of singling out Israel for condemnation.

In a post on X, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced the sanctions under a February executive order targeting those who “prompt International Criminal Court (ICC) action against U.S. and Israeli officials, companies, and executives.” He accused Albanese of waging “political and economic warfare” against both nations and asserted that “such efforts will no longer be tolerated.”

“Today I am imposing sanctions on UN Human Rights Council Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese for her illegitimate and shameful efforts to prompt [International Criminal Court] action against U.S. and Israeli officials, companies, and executives,” Rubio announced on X/Twitter.

“Albanese’s campaign of political and economic warfare against the United States and Israel will no longer be tolerated,” declared the Trump administration’s top foreign affairs official. “We will always stand by our partners in their right to self-defense.”  

Rubio concluded: “The United States will continue to take whatever actions we deem necessary to respond to lawfare and protect our sovereignty and that of our allies.”

The decision to impose sanctions on Albanese marks an escalation in the ongoing feud between the White House and the United Nations over Israel. The Trump administration has repeatedly accused the UN and Albanese of unfairly targeting Israel and mischaracterizing the Jewish state’s conduct in Gaza. 

Albanese, an Italian lawyer and academic, has held the position of UN special rapporteur on human rights in the Palestinian territories since 2022. The position authorizes her to monitor and report on alleged “human rights violations” by Israel against Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza. 

Last week, Albanese issued a scathing report accusing companies of helping Israel maintain a so-called “genocide economy.” She called on the companies to cut off economic ties with Israel and warned that they might be guilty of “complicity” in the so-called “genocide” in Gaza. 

Critics of Albanese have long accused her of exhibiting an excessive anti-Israel bias, calling into question her fairness and neutrality.

Albanese has an extensive history of using her role at the UN to denigrate Israel and seemingly rationalize Hamas’ attacks on the Jewish state.

In the months following the Palestinian terrorist group’s atrocities across southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, Albanese accused the Jewish state of perpetrating a “genocide” against the Palestinian people in revenge for the attacks and circulated a widely derided and heavily disputed report alleging that 186,000 people had been killed in the Gaza war as a result of Israeli actions. 

The action comes as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu visits Washington, where he has received a warm reception from the Trump administration. Netanyahu has been meeting with US officials to discuss next steps in the ongoing Gaza military operation. 

Gideon Sa’ar, Minister of Foreign Affairs for Israel, commended the Rubio announcement with his own post on X/Twitter, exclaiming: A clear message. Time for the UN to pay attention!” 

The post US Clamps Sanctions on Israel-bashing UN Rights Monitor Albanese first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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Hardball: Trump Administration Reports Harvard to Accreditor Over Antisemitism Allegations

US President Donald Trump speaks during a Cabinet meeting at the White House in Washington, DC, July 8, 2025. Photo: Kevin Lamarque via Reuters Connect.

The Trump administration escalated its showdown against Harvard University on Wednesday, reporting the institution to its accreditor for alleged civil rights violations resulting from its weak response to reports of antisemitic bullying, discrimination, and harassment following Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023 massacre across southern Israel.

The US Department of Education (DOE) announced the action on Wednesday. Citing Harvard’s admitted failure to treat antisemitism as seriously as it treated others forms of hatred in the past, the DOE called on the New England Commission of Higher Education to review and, potentially, revoke its accreditation — a designation which qualifies Harvard for federal funding and attests to the quality of the educational services its provides.

“Accrediting bodies play a significant role in preserving academic integrity and a campus culture conducive to truth seeking and learning,” said Secretary of Education Linda McMahon. “Part of that is ensuring students are safe on campus and abiding by federal laws that guarantee educational opportunities to all students. By allowing anti-Semitic harassment and discrimination to persist unchecked on its campus, Harvard University has failed in its obligation to students, educators, and American taxpayers.”

The DOE, McMahon added, “expects the New England Commission of Higher Education to enforce its policies and practices, and to keep the Department fully informed of its efforts to ensure that Harvard is in compliance with federal law and accreditor standards.”

As previously reported by The Algemeiner, Harvard’s Presidential Task Force on Combating Antisemitism has acknowledged that the university administration’s handling of campus antisemitism fell well below its obligations under both Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and its own nondiscrimination policies.

In a 300-plus-page report, the task force compiled a comprehensive record of antisemitic incidents on Harvard’s campus in recent years — from the Harvard Palestine Solidarity Committee’s endorsement of the Oct. 7 terrorist atrocities to an anti-Zionist faculty group’s sharing an antisemitic cartoon depicting Jews as murderers of people of color. The report identified Harvard’s past refusal to afford Jews the same protections against discrimination enjoyed by other minority groups as a key source of its problem.

Coming several weeks after President Donald Trump ordered the freeze of $2.26 billion in federal research grants and contracts for Harvard, the task force report found it was “clear” that antisemitism and anti-Israel bias have been fomented, practiced, and tolerated not only at Harvard but also within academia more widely.”

The university is now suing the federal government over the funding halt.

President Trump has spoken scathingly of Harvard, calling it, for example, an “Anti-Semitic, Far Left Institute … with students being accepted from all over the world that want to rip our Country apart” in an April post to his Truth Social platform.

In recent weeks, however, both Trump and McMahon had commended Harvard’s constructive response in negotiations over reforms the administration has asked it to implement as a precondition for restoring federal funds. The requested reforms include hiring more conservative faculty, shuttering diversity, equity, and inclusion [DEI] programs, and slashing the size of administrative offices tangential to the university’s central educational mission.

The administration has since changed its tone in the wake of a report by The Harvard Crimson that interim Harvard President Alan Garber has said “behind closed doors” that he has no intention of doing anything that would make Harvard more palatable to conservatives.

Earlier this month, the Trump administration’s Joint Task Force to Combat Antisemitism issued Harvard a formal “notice of violation” of civil rights law. Charging that Harvard willfully exposed Jewish students to a flood of racist and antisemitic abuse both in and outside of the classroom, it threatened to strip whatever remains of Harvard’s federal funding.

“Failure to institute adequate changes immediately will result in the loss of all federal financial resources and continue to affect Harvard’s relationship with the federal government,” wrote the federal officials comprising the multiagency Task Force. “Harvard may of course continue to operate free of federal privileges, and perhaps such an opportunity will spur a commitment to excellence that will help Harvard thrive once again.”

In Wednesday’s announcement, US Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said Harvard’s conduct “forfeits the legitimacy that accreditation is designed to uphold.”

“HHS and Department of Education will actively hold Harvard accountable through sustained oversight until it restores public trust and ensures a campus free of discrimination,” he said.

Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.

The post Hardball: Trump Administration Reports Harvard to Accreditor Over Antisemitism Allegations first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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IDF Strikes Hezbollah Sites in South Lebanon as Terror Group Pushes to Rebuild Amid US Disarmament Talks

IDF operating in southern Lebanon. Photo: IDF Spokesperson

Israeli forces uncovered and destroyed Hezbollah weapons caches in southern Lebanon on Wednesday, as a new report indicated that despite ongoing U.S.-led efforts to secure a disarmament deal, the Iran-backed group is making repeated, largely concealed attempts to rebuild its military presence in the area.

Troops carried out several operations targeting Hezbollah infrastructure in southern Lebanon on Wednesday morning, destroying weapons depots, explosives and multibarrel launchers concealed in forested terrain, the IDF said, in violation of the November ceasefire, which requires Hezbollah to withdraw its forces 20 miles from the Israeli border.

A new report released this week by the Alma Research and Education Center found that Hezbollah is focused on rebuilding in three areas: operational deployment, weapons acquisition, and financial recovery. 

“Hezbollah didn’t give up its resistance narrative and motivation,” Alma’s director, Lt. Col. (Res.) Sarit Zehavi, told The Algemeiner

“It wants to rebuild its capabilities and infrastructures, whether it’s the villages that will be used as human shields or the military infrastructure in South Lebanon and in Lebanon in general.”

According to Zehavi, Hezbollah is attempting to return Radwan fighters to positions south of the Litani River as part of a wider plan to restore its elite forces to operational readiness. The IDF on Monday killed Radwan commander Ali Abd al-Hassan Haidar in a targeted strike. The action came hours after US Special Envoy for Syria Thomas Barrack met with Lebanese President Joseph Aoun, Prime Minister Nawaf Salam and Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri in Beirut to discuss a long-term deal that would include an Israeli withdrawal and complete disarmament of Hezbollah.

Barrack described the Lebanese response to the proposal as positive. Later, he issued a blunt warning to Hezbollah in response to a vow by the terror group’s leader, Naim Qassem, not to lay down its arms. “If they mess with us anywhere in the world, they will have a serious problem with us,” Barrack said in an interview with Lebanese news network LBCI. “They don’t want that.” 

Zehavi said it was premature to predict the outcome of the diplomatic efforts. She warned that the challenge of disarming Hezbollah remains enormous and emphasized that the Lebanese Armed Forces have not demonstrated the capability or willingness to confront the group.

“It’s too soon to be optimistic or pessimistic,” she said, noting that no firm commitments have emerged from the Beirut talks. 

Hezbollah’s efforts to smuggle and manufacture weapons have been complicated by both Israeli strikes and the regional realignment over recent months. While Israeli strikes have disrupted many supply routes, according to Zehavi, Syrian authorities have intercepted far more Hezbollah-bound weapons than the Lebanese Army, which claims to have uncovered 500 arms caches but has provided no evidence.

The financial front marks the third aspect of Hezbollah’s rebuilding effort. Last week, the group halted cash payments to Shiite civilians whose homes were damaged in the war, citing liquidity problems. Zehavi attributed the shortfall to disruptions in Iran’s funding networks — an outcome of the 12-day war against the regime in Tehran — and said the constraints would likely hamper Hezbollah’s ability to compensate its base and sustain operations. 

“I hope they will continue to have problems with the cash flow, that way it will be very difficult for them to recover,” she said.

The post IDF Strikes Hezbollah Sites in South Lebanon as Terror Group Pushes to Rebuild Amid US Disarmament Talks first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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