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Israel Killed a Terror Operative in Gaza, Not a Journalist
23-year-old German-Israeli Shani Louk, who was murdered by Hamas on October 7, 2023. (Photo: Instagram)
Calling a terror operative a journalist doesn’t make him one.
Just ask the Associated Press (AP). The vaunted news agency’s rough schooling in this lesson began with a mundane correspondence, progressed to the most devastating slaughter of Jews since the Holocaust, and continued with a hugely embarrassing court case.
The first chapter of the unfortunate saga dates to 2018. At the time, the Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America questioned the AP’s reliance on photographer Hassan Eslaiah, identified in the wire service coverage as a “local journalist” who corroborated a Hamas accusation that Israel was responsible for the death of a child at the Gaza border fence.
When CAMERA requested specifics regarding Eslaiah’s journalistic credentials, an AP official declined to identify the Palestinian’s professional affiliation. The editor insisted that he “is independent and reliable and not Hamas.”
CAMERA did its own research, and in very short order discovered an Electronic Intifada article revealing that the “not Hamas” source was, at the time, a camera operator with the very much Hamas-affiliated Quds TV.
CAMERA shared this information with the AP. But the news agency, which says it its “advancing the power of facts,” failed to amend its coverage to acknowledge that the supposedly independent and reliable local journalist, who ostensibly substantiated an unverified Hamas claim, was himself working with Hamas.
Later, in 2020, CAMERA tweeted a photograph of Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar kissing and embracing Eslaiah, and tagged the AP.
Fast forward to Oct. 7, 2023. By then, Eslaiah’s status at the AP had advanced. He was no longer a “local journalist” trotted out to verify Hamas’ questionable claims. He was now the wire service’s freelance photographer at the forefront of Hamas’ horrific massacre, earning cash for his images of the unspeakable terror carried out by his Hamas colleagues.
“Not Hamas” Eslaiah was among the freelance photographers from the Gaza Strip who crossed the border into Israel alongside thousands of Hamas-led terrorists who came to murder, rape, kidnap, torture, maim, and loot.
The most recent chapter of the AP’s hard knocks education in the mutually exclusive professions of journalism and terror moves from the killing fields of southern Israel to the Federal court of the Southern District of Florida.
As reported in The Times of Israel, terror victims sued the Associated Press in February 2024 for publishing Eslaiah’s Oct. 7 photographs, charging: “AP has long been on notice of their freelancer’s Hamas connections, and chose to ignore those connections.”
A recap: the AP was on notice because of CAMERA’s 2018 correspondence. The CAMERA-AP exchange stands at the foundation of the terror victim’s lawsuit against the leading news agency.
In those 2018 emails, dusted off in 2024 by studious lawyers who did their homework, CAMERA also documented that Eslaiah’s social media was a veritable reader’s guide to ideological identification with Hamas, glorification of terrorism, and anti-Jewish statements.
Even following Oct. 7, Eslaiah’s social media was as open as a textbook. A November 2023 CAMERA report documented Eslaiah’s celebration of the Oct. 7 atrocities, including praise for the Hamas “warriors” and reflections on how “storming the settlements” is a “beautiful thing.”
But Eslaiah’s identification with Hamas didn’t stop at lyrical posts. Last April, when Eslaiah was injured in an Israeli airstrike, the Israel Defense Forces and Shin Bet reported that Eslaiah was a member of Hamas’ Khan Younis Brigade and was operating “under the guise of a journalist and owner of a press company.”
When Hassan Eslaiah was killed in an Israeli air strike this week, Hamas rushed to claim that a journalist was among the three fatalities.
As the lawsuit against the AP is still ongoing, the final chapter of the AP’s Eslaiah Hamas-not-journalist curriculum has yet to be written. Nevertheless, the enduring lesson should be clear: a terror operative is not a journalist.
And yet, the slow learners are nothing if not consistent: “Gaza journalist Hassan Aslih killed in Israeli strike,” BBC blared. “Israeli strike on Gaza hospital kills wounded journalist,” Reuters misled.
Tamar Sternthal is director of the Israel office of CAMERA.
The post Israel Killed a Terror Operative in Gaza, Not a Journalist first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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After False Dawns, Gazans Hope Trump Will Force End to Two-Year-Old War
Palestinians walk past a residential building destroyed in previous Israeli strikes, after Hamas agreed to release hostages and accept some other terms in a US plan to end the war, in Nuseirat, central Gaza Strip October 4, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Mahmoud Issa
Exhausted Palestinians in Gaza clung to hopes on Saturday that US President Donald Trump would keep up pressure on Israel to end a two-year-old war that has killed tens of thousands and displaced the entire population of more than two million.
Hamas’ declaration that it was ready to hand over hostages and accept some terms of Trump’s plan to end the conflict while calling for more talks on several key issues was greeted with relief in the enclave, where most homes are now in ruins.
“It’s happy news, it saves those who are still alive,” said 32-year-old Saoud Qarneyta, reacting to Hamas’ response and Trump’s intervention. “This is enough. Houses have been damaged, everything has been damaged, what is left? Nothing.”
GAZAN RESIDENT HOPES ‘WE WILL BE DONE WITH WARS’
Ismail Zayda, 40, a father of three, displaced from a suburb in northern Gaza City where Israel launched a full-scale ground operation last month, said: “We want President Trump to keep pushing for an end to the war, if this chance is lost, it means that Gaza City will be destroyed by Israel and we might not survive.
“Enough, two years of bombardment, death and starvation. Enough,” he told Reuters on a social media chat.
“God willing this will be the last war. We will hopefully be done with the wars,” said 59-year-old Ali Ahmad, speaking in one of the tented camps where most Palestinians now live.
“We urge all sides not to backtrack. Every day of delay costs lives in Gaza, it is not just time wasted, lives get wasted too,” said Tamer Al-Burai, a Gaza City businessman displaced with members of his family in central Gaza Strip.
After two previous ceasefires — one near the start of the war and another earlier this year — lasted only a few weeks, he said; “I am very optimistic this time, maybe Trump’s seeking to be remembered as a man of peace, will bring us real peace this time.”
RESIDENT WORRIES THAT NETANYAHU WILL ‘SABOTAGE’ DEAL
Some voiced hopes of returning to their homes, but the Israeli military issued a fresh warning to Gazans on Saturday to stay out of Gaza City, describing it as a “dangerous combat zone.”
Gazans have faced previous false dawns during the past two years, when Trump and others declared at several points during on-off negotiations between Hamas, Israel and Arab and US mediators that a deal was close, only for war to rage on.
“Will it happen? Can we trust Trump? Maybe we trust Trump, but will Netanyahu abide this time? He has always sabotaged everything and continued the war. I hope he ends it now,” said Aya, 31, who was displaced with her family to Deir Al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip.
She added: “Maybe there is a chance the war ends at October 7, two years after it began.”
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Mass Rally in Rome on Fourth Day of Italy’s Pro-Palestinian Protests
A Pro-Palestinian demonstrator waves a Palestinian flag during a national protest for Gaza in Rome, Italy, October 4, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Claudia Greco
Large crowds assembled in central Rome on Saturday for the fourth straight day of protests in Italy since Israel intercepted an international flotilla trying to deliver aid to Gaza, and detained its activists.
People holding banners and Palestinian flags, chanting “Free Palestine” and other slogans, filed past the Colosseum, taking part in a march that organizers hoped would attract at least 1 million people.
“I’m here with a lot of other friends because I think it is important for us all to mobilize individually,” Francesco Galtieri, a 65-year-old musician from Rome, said. “If we don’t all mobilize, then nothing will change.”
Since Israel started blocking the flotilla late on Wednesday, protests have sprung up across Europe and in other parts of the world, but in Italy they have been a daily occurrence, in multiple cities.
On Friday, unions called a general strike in support of the flotilla, with demonstrations across the country that attracted more than 2 million, according to organizers. The interior ministry estimated attendance at around 400,000.
Italy’s right-wing government has been critical of the protests, with Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni suggesting that people would skip work for Gaza just as an excuse for a longer weekend break.
On Saturday, Meloni blamed protesters for insulting graffiti that appeared on a statue of the late Pope John Paul II outside Rome’s main train station, where Pro-Palestinian groups have been holding a protest picket.
“They say they are taking to the streets for peace, but then they insult the memory of a man who was a true defender and builder of peace. A shameful act committed by people blinded by ideology,” she said in a statement.
Israel launched its Gaza offensive after Hamas terrorists staged a cross border attack on October 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people and taking 251 people hostage.
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Hamas Says It Agrees to Release All Israeli Hostages Under Trump Gaza Plan
Smoke rises during an Israeli military operation in Gaza City, as seen from the central Gaza Strip, October 2, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Dawoud Abu Alkas
Hamas said on Friday it had agreed to release all Israeli hostages, alive or dead, under the terms of US President Donald Trump’s Gaza proposal, and signaled readiness to immediately enter mediated negotiations to discuss the details.