Connect with us

RSS

Media Ignore Hamas’ Praise for the UN After Gaza Ceasefire Resolution

United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres speaks at the UN headquarters in New York City, US, before a meeting about the conflict in Gaza, Nov. 6, 2023. Photo: REUTERS/Caitlin Ochs

On December 12, the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) demanded an immediate ceasefire in the Israel-Hamas war. Its resolution has been widely covered in the news.

But mainstream media outlets didn’t report that Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh, on a televised broadcast the next day, thanked the UN Secretary-General and welcomed the UN General Assembly’s move.

By omitting that fact, as well as other connections between the UN and anti-Israel forces, media outlets have misrepresented reality and framed it in a way that effectively undermines Israel’s position.

A survey of last week’s coverage by major media outlets reveals that the narrative had already been set on December 12, the day of the UN vote. It included reporting on the “overwhelming” ceasefire vote of the General Assembly, and comments from Israeli, US, and Palestinian diplomats.

These reports were not updated to include Haniyeh’s comments on December 13, in which he praised the ceasefire efforts of UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres and welcomed the UNGA resolution. Almost no one wrote individual stories about this. Instead, some media outlets included a short reference to Haniyeh in their ongoing war stories, claiming that any solution in Gaza without Hamas was a “delusion.”

Here is what Haniyeh said:

We also express our appreciation for the positions of the Secretary-General of the United Nations, António Guterres, especially his message to the Security Council concerning the situation in the Palestinian territories, regarding it as a threat to international peace and security, in implementation of Article 99 of the United Nations Charter.

Accordingly, a draft ceasefire resolution was presented, but like its predecessors, it met an American veto. We also welcome the resolution issued by the United Nations General Assembly yesterday, which stipulates a ceasefire by an overwhelming majority. We are certain that the brutal aggression will end and the resistance will remain a faithful guardian of the rights and legitimate aspirations of our people.

And here’s what some media outlets actually chose to mention:

I say that any bet concerning arrangements in Gaza or in the Palestinian issue in general without Hamas and the resistance factions are nothing but illusion and mirage. Illusion and mirage. Illusion and mirage.

Reuters, AP, and AFP Reframe Reality

For example, the world’s major wire services all ignored Haniyeh’s praise for the UN and its Secretary-General.

Reuters’ article on the ceasefire resolution, which preceded Haniyeh’s statement, has not been updated to include his later comments. It still quotes the Palestinian Authority’s UN envoy as a representative of the Palestinian side:

Palestinian Palestinian U.N. envoy Riyad Mansour, citing large pro-Palestinian protests around the world, said the U.S. could not continue “to ignore this massive power.” He described the General Assembly vote as a culmination of public sentiment.

Another relevant Reuters story did add a comment from a Hamas official, but it wasn’t updated later to include the statement of the terror group’s leader.

Only a day after Haniyeh spoke, in the middle of an ongoing news story about the war, did Reuters include one line referring to what Haniyeh had said regarding Hamas:

In a televised address, Hamas Chief Ismail Haniyeh said any future arrangement in Gaza without Hamas was a “delusion.”

Did the Reuters crew in charge of monitoring such statements choose to highlight only this part? Did an editor bother to demand a translation of the whole statement to make sure nothing was missed? Either way, important facts were left out.

What makes this omission and minimization even more disturbing is that last month Reuters published an entire piece featuring Haniyeh as an important figure:

The AP went down a similar route. Its story on the UN vote has not been updated to include Haniyeh’s comments. It still quotes only the Palestinian Authority representative as a Palestinian voice. A later, ongoing news story that was used by ABC News, includes a short reference to what Haniyeh said about a future without Hamas as an “illusion”:

Late Wednesday, Hamas’ supreme leader, Ismail Haniyeh, said any plans for Gaza that do not involve Hamas are an “illusion and mirage,” though he said the group is open to halting the fighting. Speaking to Al-Masira TV, a channel linked to Yemen’s Houthi militant group, he claimed Hamas had dealt a “resounding blow” to Israel. Haniyeh lives in exile in Qatar, but it was not clear where he was when he made those comments.

The AFP at least published a separate story on Haniyeh’s statement, but included the same quote about Hamas with no mention of the terror group leader’s warm words for the UN and its Secretary-General.

Unfortunately, none of the major news agencies (although there was a fuller report on the Chinese Xinhua) gave its consumers the full picture they deserved.

And it seems that other media outlets, whether they rely on the wire services (like hundreds of news outlets) or not, didn’t make an independent effort to report on Haniyeh’s public comments, as is clear from the lack of coverage in The New York Times, Washington Post or BBC, to name a few.

The wire services distorted the picture, and this skewed narrative was picked up by other media outlets: They erased the fact that a brutal terror group celebrated the UN ceasefire resolution.

Could it be that media outlets didn’t realize how important it was to report that the leader of a barbaric group that massacred and kidnapped innocent Jews on October 7, was happy with the United Nations? Isn’t it worth noting how embarrassing it is for the UN to be flattered by genocidal terrorists who couldn’t care less about international law? Or did it not “fit” the narrative?

At the very least, it seems that these outlets didn’t serve their audience or fulfill their mission of accurately representing reality.

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 Media Ignore Hamas’ Praise for the UN After Gaza Ceasefire Resolution first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

Continue Reading
Click to comment

You must be logged in to post a comment Login

Leave a Reply

RSS

DePaul University Enabled Violent Attacks and Brain Injury on Jewish Students

DePaul University Law School. Photo: ajay_suresh/Wikimedia Commons.

My name is Brooke Goldstein. I am the founder and executive director of The Lawfare Project, and the founder of the #EndJewHatred civil rights movement. I have dedicated my career to upholding the legal rights of the Jewish people, a fight that is all the more pressing after the wave of Jew-hatred unleashed in America and around the world following the Hamas terrorist attacks of October 7, 2023.

In 2021, a few years before October 7, a Jewish student identified a major problem at DePaul University. She went public about “a long history of antisemitism on DePaul’s campus … without DePaul doing anything really substantive to address this situation.”

In a clear call for action, she said that, “DePaul, as an administration and as a university, doesn’t fully understand what is required for Jewish students in particular to feel safe in their campus community.”

The unprecedented wave of hatred launched against Jews and Israelis at DePaul University over the past year is a direct result of the administration’s failure — not just to help its Jewish community feel safe, but to actually keep its Jewish students safe.

Jew-hatred has become systematized in higher education, and we are now seeing the consequences playing out on campuses across the country — including at DePaul University.

Radicalized agitators who openly support foreign terrorist organizations target Jewish students with calls for their genocide.

“From the river to the sea” is a call for genocide.

“Globalize the intifada” is a call for worldwide violent attacks on Jews, like we see in the streets of New York City and Amsterdam, and on campus here at DePaul.

Jews are dehumanized, deprived of the right to openly express their identity, and the civil rights of Jewish students are ignored and violated — their minority status disregarded, and the harm and violence they endure is minimized. All of this is unacceptable.

Max Long emigrated to Israel from Boston in 2015. He served in the Israel Defense Forces, and, when he was released from the reserves, enrolled at DePaul University in March of this year. After seeing the pervasive atmosphere of antisemitism and anti-Israel rhetoric on campus, he was inspired to use his voice and personal experience to empower and educate his classmates about antisemitism, and about the war against Palestinian terrorism in Gaza.

Michael Kaminsky is a junior who came to DePaul from Buffalo Grove, IL. He, too, has been inspired to use his voice and experience to empower and educate the community about antisemitism, and about Jewish identity. He is a founding member of DePaul’s chapter of Students Supporting Israel, a StandWithUs Emerson fellow, and a proud member of AEPi.

Max and Michael are proud and empowered advocates for Jewish civil rights. They are loud voices for the indigenous rights of the Jewish people in their indigenous homeland — Israel.

On November 6, Jew-haters decided to silence their voices. Two masked men violently attacked Max and Michael with such force that Max suffered a brain injury and Michael suffered a fracture and lacerations.

Max and Michael were doing what they have done many times before — exercising their right to peacefully express themselves and their views, and engage with passersby.

This attack happened in the plain sight of a DePaul public safety officer, who did nothing to intervene. The officer had an opportunity to stop the attack, but did nothing to help Max and Michael.

But it gets worse.

The university was well aware of multiple threats against Max and Michael, just as it was aware of the campus climate of hate targeting Jews. But it did nothing. It failed to protect its students, even when a violent attack was unfolding in front of one of its public safety officers. This cannot be tolerated.

We cannot be silent in the face of intolerance and injustice. This is why The Lawfare Project represents Max and Michael — to demand justice, to ensure that their rights are protected, and to make sure that what they experienced is not experienced by any other Jewish student at DePaul University.

Even now, their attackers remain at large. We demand that the Chicago Police Department use every tool at its disposal to arrest those responsible, and that they be prosecuted for the hate crime they committed, to the full extent of the law. We need to impose meaningful consequences on antisemitic hate crimes to deter future attacks, and to send the clear message that our society rejects this extremist hate and violence.

As for the university, our attorneys are reviewing all options, including legal options, to make sure that the school is accountable not just to Max and Michael for this attack, but to all Jewish students who are under daily threat of similar attacks.

We are here to make sure that DePaul does the right thing, and will take whatever action is necessary to do so.

Jew-hatred has no place at DePaul, or on any college campus. We are demanding action from the school — as all decent people should.

Max and Michael are not alone. Our Jewish students on campus are not alone. We are all here for them, and we will make sure that their rights are protected and upheld.

Brooke Goldstein is the founder and executive director of The Lawfare Project and the founder of the End Jew Hatred movement. She is also an author, award-winning, filmmaker, and regular news television commentator. 

The post DePaul University Enabled Violent Attacks and Brain Injury on Jewish Students first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

Continue Reading

RSS

UK Will Arrest Netanyahu With ‘Due Process’ if He Visits, Foreign Secretary Says

Britain’s Foreign Secretary David Lammy leaves Downing Street, following the results of the election, in London, Britain, July 5, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Toby Melville

Britain would follow due process if Benjamin Netanyahu visited the UK, foreign minister David Lammy said on Monday, when asked if London would fulfill the International Criminal Court’s arrest warrant against the Israeli prime minister.

“We are signatories to the Rome Statute, we have always been committed to our obligations under international law and international humanitarian law,” Lammy told reporters at a G7 meeting in Italy.

“Of course, if there were to be such a visit to the UK, there would be a court process and due process would be followed in relation to those issues.”

The post UK Will Arrest Netanyahu With ‘Due Process’ if He Visits, Foreign Secretary Says first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

Continue Reading

RSS

How reality TV got real: A review of Emily Nussbaum’s ‘Cue the Sun!’

There’s a trope on sitcoms where characters think they’re being filmed for a reality television show, when in fact what they’re experiencing is real life. (Real life within the fictional […]

The post How reality TV got real: A review of Emily Nussbaum’s ‘Cue the Sun!’ appeared first on The Canadian Jewish News.

Continue Reading

Copyright © 2017 - 2023 Jewish Post & News