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Media Lies About Hamas Harm the United States

Hamas chief Ismail Haniyeh speaks during a press conference in Tehran, Iran, March 26, 2024. Photo: Majid Asgaripour/WANA (West Asia News Agency) via REUTERS

JNS.org – Former Hamas chief Ismail Haniyeh explained why he has no problem when Palestinians in Gaza are killed: “The blood of the women, children and elderly … we are the ones who need this blood, so it awakens within us the revolutionary spirit.”

Haniyeh was recently assassinated in Tehran. Despite his monstrous deeds over the decades, some prominent media lamented the passing of what they called a “moderate.”

Likewise, many media attempt to whitewash Hamas terrorists and the group itself, which is designated by the United States, Canada, the UK, EU and Japan as a terrorist organization. Strikingly, mainstream media doggedly avoid the label, preferring to call Hamas terrorists “fighters,” “militants” or “gunmen.” Encyclopedia Britannica says felicitously that Hamas is a “militant Palestinian nationalist and Islamist movement,” avoiding the terrorist designation.

But the word terrorism means something. It describes violent acts directed at innocent civilians to achieve a political or military objective. It’s the precise word for what Palestinians—and especially Hamas—do on a daily basis.

Indeed, Palestinians have honed their terrorism tactics over decades to a gruesome, deadly skill, which they’ve used to kill and injure thousands of Israelis in suicide bombings of public buses, restaurants and religious events.

But Hamas has taken terrorism to new levels—from their targeting of some 10,000 rockets at Israel’s civilian centers to the barbaric Oct. 7 massacre, in which they mutilated, raped and kidnapped some 1,500 innocent children, elderly, mothers and fathers.

When a media organization chooses not to describe such acts as terrorism but rather to use words like “resistance”—they are lying. But more than lying: Under the cover of “journalism,” they promote a radical-left political line, which in Hamas’s case is justification to kill Jews as part of a global Islamist jihad.

Indeed, much media coverage of Hamas supports the terrorist group’s false narrative that it is a liberation movement fighting for Palestinian independence, rather than for the Islamic state clearly described in its official charter.

The media’s whitewash of Haniyeh, Hamas and its savage terrorist minions openly serves to support campus radicals who call for genocide in Israel “from the river to the sea.” These media lies also falsely excuse the Biden administration’s restrictions on weapon shipments to Israel and its calls for an immediate ceasefire, preventing Israel’s destruction of Hamas.

Haniyeh was no “moderate.” For 30 years, he developed an organization of monsters. While media in the 1930s often made excuses for Adolf Hitler’s aggression, they never called him a moderate. But that’s exactly what the BBC and The Washington Post called Haniyeh. CNN called him a “moderating force,” while The Wall Street Journal described him as “the strongest voice advocating for a ceasefire.”

Yet Haniyeh bore responsibility for all Hamas’s evils—from expelling the Palestinian Authority from Gaza in 2007 to throwing members of the Fatah ruling party from rooftops and bombing Israeli population centers to the Oct. 7 mass murder. Haniyeh is an undisputed war criminal for headquartering Hamas military forces in and under civilian residences, schools, hospitals and mosques. No wonder the US named him a “specially designated global terrorist.”

The media disguise Hamas as if they are not terrorists at all. Indeed, Al Jazeera describes the group’s genocidal acts as “armed resistance,” as does PBS, which used the same term to describe Hamas in an article published just three days after the Oct. 7 massacre.

The BBC justifies not calling Hamas terrorists by saying, “It’s simply not the BBC’s job to tell people who to support and who to condemn—who are the good guys and who are the bad guys.” This moral agnosticism is arrogant nonsense. The dictionary definition of terrorism is not subjective; it does not take sides: The term applies unequivocally to Hamas’s actions, which are evil.

The Hamas Charter clearly defines the group as a genocidal terrorist movement. Its preamble reads: “Israel … will continue to exist until Islam will obliterate it.” It continues: “There is no solution for the Palestinian problem except by jihad.” Furthermore, “The Day of Judgment will not come about until Muslims fight Jews and kill them.” Hamas doesn’t only advocate “armed resistance.” It advocates armed genocide.

Hamas has the blood of thousands of innocents on its hands. Even before Oct. 7, Hamas terrorist attacks killed thousands of Israelis and citizens of other countries. The terrorist group purposely targets civilians with suicide bombings, shootings, stabbings, car-rammings and thousands of rockets launched at Israeli communities.

Hamas ruthlessly oppresses its own people. Though Gazans are oppressed by the cruel tyranny of the Hamas dictatorship—with no civil liberties or rule of law, arbitrary arrests, torture, oppression of women, theft of humanitarian aid and use of human shields—the media unconscionably ignore these conditions. Nor do they mention that Hamas repeatedly provokes war against Israel and is responsible for tens of thousands of war dead in Gaza.

The media’s whitewash of Hamas and their crimes encourages the “ceasefire hoax.” Media coverage of Hamas promotes the terrorist group’s false narrative that they are fighting for Palestinian self-determination—and the lie that Israel is responsible for Gazans killed in the war that Hamas started. These myths also support the Biden Administration’s pressure on Israel for an immediate ceasefire and cutting off weapon supplies.

More than harming Israel, the media cover-up of Hamas’s monstrosities betrays the United States. Only a tiny minority of nations have democracies as strong as Israel’s; no nation so consistently supports US security interests on the ground in the Middle East and international forums; and few nations engender so strongly the political and religious values on which the United States was founded. Any narrative that portrays Hamas as the “good guy” and Israel as the “bad guy” is not just false, it betrays the US.

Whitewashing the evil of the Hamas terrorist group is not only a travesty and an injustice against the Jewish state, it’s a betrayal of America’s interests and values. As surely as Hamas opposes Israel, it’s also a proxy of global jihadist Iran and, as such, viciously wishes death to the United States.

The post Media Lies About Hamas Harm the United States first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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Why Hamas is Still Around: A Global Failure That Must End Now

Hamas terrorists appear to shoot civilians who are lying on the ground in a video posted by Gaza Now, a Hamas-aligned news outlet based in Gaza. Photo: Screenshot

Hamas should have been wiped off the face of the earth by now. Instead, it still breathes, still kills, and still holds hostages. Why? Because the world enables it. Because cowardice and political games have taken precedence over justice. Because the so-called “international community” would rather see Israel restrained than see Hamas destroyed.

Hamas is not a political movement. It is a death cult. It massacres civilians, rapes women, kills children, and brags about it. It launches rockets from hospitals, schools, and mosques, knowing full well that the bleeding-heart elites in the West will cry “war crimes” the moment Israel dares to fight back. This is not resistance. This is terrorism, pure and simple.

Why are Israeli hostages still in Gaza? Because Hamas knows that playing with human lives gives it power. The world lets Hamas get away with this obscene game, treating it like a legitimate actor rather than the terrorist mafia that it is. Every hostage negotiation drags on endlessly, designed to humiliate Israel and make Hamas look like a force to be reckoned with.

Hamas does not negotiate in good faith. It tortures, rapes, and brutalizes its captives. It holds them in underground tunnels like animals. It strings out their release to extract maximum concessions. And the world watches, shrugs, and calls for “restraint.”

Restraint? Against monsters who burn babies alive? Israel should not be negotiating with Hamas. It should be erasing it.

Israel’s soldiers have laid down their lives to protect their people, but they have been betrayed — not by their government, but by a world that refuses to let them finish the job. The IDF has fought heroically, navigating the impossible battlefield of Gaza while trying to minimize civilian casualties — something Hamas never even considers. Yet every loss Israel suffers is met with silence, while every Hamas casualty is met with international outrage. The double standard is sickening.

Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu have long warned the world about Hamas. Trump took a hardline stance against radical terror groups, cutting off their funding and isolating their enablers. Netanyahu has been calling for decisive action for years. But instead of listening, the world mocked them. Now, as Hamas continues to slaughter and kidnap, their words ring more true than ever.
Last week, Trump and Netanyahu met in Washington to discuss a solution to the Hamas problem. Netanyahu vowed that Israel would “finish the job,” while Trump proposed a shocking idea: a US takeover of Gaza to rebuild it into a “Middle Eastern Riviera.” The response? The usual hand-wringing and excuses. The world is too spineless to take action, too blinded by its hatred of Israel to see the truth: Hamas will not stop until it is obliterated.

A sickening new narrative has emerged: “Israel lost the war.” Why? Because Hamas still exists. Because it still fires rockets. Because it still holds hostages. This defeatist nonsense is exactly what Hamas thrives on. The media paints a picture of Israel as a struggling, wounded nation, while portraying Hamas as a scrappy underdog. This distortion is not just irresponsible — it’s deadly. It emboldens Hamas, encourages further terror, and pressures Israel to back down.

Israel has not lost. The only way Israel loses is if it stops fighting. And that cannot happen.

Let’s talk about Qatar — the rich, two-faced Gulf state that bankrolls Hamas while pretending to mediate peace. Qatar hosts Hamas leaders in luxury hotels, funds their operations, and provides them with a political shield. And yet, the world still treats Qatar as a “partner.” Enough. Qatar must be sanctioned, isolated, and treated as what it is: the financial lifeline of a terrorist empire.
No more fake diplomacy. No more pretending Qatar is a neutral player. Any nation that funds Hamas is complicit in its crimes.

The only real solution is complete eradication. No ceasefires, no negotiations, no half-measures. Hamas is a cancer, and you do not negotiate with cancer. You cut it out.

Israel must be given full support to finish the war. The world must stop pretending Hamas is a political entity and recognize it for what it truly is: a genocidal terrorist cult that thrives on Western weakness. And those who support Hamas — whether they be nations, media outlets, or activists — must be called out and held accountable.

The suffering of Israeli hostages, the deaths of Israeli soldiers, and the continued existence of Hamas must not become just another tragic chapter in history. The time for words is over. The time for total eradication is now.

Amine Ayoub, a Middle East Forum fellow, is a policy analyst and writer based in Morocco.

The post Why Hamas is Still Around: A Global Failure That Must End Now first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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Teen Vogue’s Anti-Israel Narratives Amplify Hamas Talking Points

The bodies of people, some of them elderly, lie on a street after they were killed during a mass-infiltration by Hamas gunmen from the Gaza Strip, in Sderot, southern Israel, Oct. 7, 2023. Photo: REUTERS/Ammar Awad

Once known as a publication offering beauty, fashion, and lifestyle advice to teenage girls, Teen Vogue has evolved into an outlet that frequently platforms one-sided narratives, featuring writers who have openly expressed their support for terrorism and anti-Israel rhetoric online. 

Esraa Abo Qamar’s piece, “Scholasticide in Gaza Means There Are Almost No Schools or Colleges Left” is just the latest to be published in Teen Vogue’s new anti-Israel mission.

The story of Esraa Abo Qamar — who goes by Esraa Sameer on social media — is undoubtedly emotional and likely resonates deeply with Teen Vogue’s target audience. As a student at the Islamic University of Gaza, Esraa had to halt her studies in October 2023 due to the outbreak of the war. Any student passionate about their education would be heartbroken to learn that a girl the same age would be forced to abandon their studies because of conflict. 

Esraa frames Israel as the perpetrator in this story, leveraging her op-ed to falsely accuse Israel of not only committing genocide, but also “scholasticide,” whereby Israel is framed as deliberately destroying the education system in Gaza. 

The term “scholasticide” was termed by none other than a former Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) official,

Karma Nabulsi. Nabulsi worked as an international spokesperson for the PLO from 1977-1990, when the organization was at its height of launching attacks against Israel. Using an emotionally charged and baseless term coined by a former member of a terrorist organization raises serious doubts about its credibility.  

Not once does Esraa mention the real culprit of the destruction of Gaza’s educational system — Hamas. Esraa fails to acknowledge that Hamas has hijacked the education system in Gaza to promote its own extremist agenda that prioritizes the destruction of the State of Israel over providing youth with a meaningful education. 

This education system has clearly worked to indoctrinate Esraa, who gleefully celebrated the Iranian regime’s October 1 missile attacks on her social media, writing “God is the greatest” over a video of missiles and calling it the “best view of my life.” 

Esraa’s Instagram story on the night of the Iranian regime’s missile attack, October 1, 2024.

Apparently, the education of Israeli students is less important, as Esraa omits that one of those missiles hit a school in Gedera.

Of course, the Hamas-run education system in Gaza doesn’t teach accurate history. Otherwise, Esraa would remember that Israel has not ruled Gaza for most of her life. While Esraa writes that Gazans have suffered under “violent military rule and apartheid” since 1948, her emotionally charged perspective on the history of Palestinians overlooks critical historical facts.

Egypt controlled the Gaza Strip from 1948 until 1967, when Israel took over the territory in a defensive war. Esraa further omits that Israel has not governed Gaza since 2005, when Israel disengaged from the territory. Since 2007, Gaza has been under the control of Hamas, which has imposed a brutal and oppressive regime that focuses on terrorizing Israelis and uprooting the Jewish State rather than taking care of its own civilians.   

Part of Hamas’ terrorism strategy comes from embedding themselves in civilian locations. In fact, Hamas has systematically taken advantage of the Islamic University of Gaza since the institution’s founding, using it as an outpost to indoctrinate students with the ideology of the Muslim Brotherhood. On multiple occasions since October 7th, Hamas has used the university to manufacture weapons and launch anti-tank missiles. In other instances, Hamas’ own misfired rockets have hit schools in Gaza. 

The accusations that Israel destroyed Gaza’s water and sanitation sites and “weaponized starvation” similarly fall short when all the facts are presented. Since the start of the war, Israel has coordinated more than 1.3 million tons of aid to be distributed in the Gaza Strip and has worked to increase the supply of clean water throughout the war. 

However, these facts don’t matter to Esraa, who merely states in passing the reason for the war starting in the first place — Hamas’ vicious terror attacks on October 7, 2023, which stole the lives of more than 1,200 Israelis, many of whom were students and young adults. 

If facts don’t matter to Esraa, then neither do definitions, as she purposefully misrepresents Zionism to be a “religious nationalist ideology,” rather than the desire for the Jewish people to live in their historic national homeland.

Students protesting this in the US aren’t simply “activists” as Esraa claims but are rather denying the Jewish people of a basic right. Moreover, the pioneers of Israel were largely secular Zionists and founded the state on that approach rather than on religious ideals. 

Esraa does get one thing right in her article — war kills dreams. Unfortunately, Hamas has chosen to perpetuate a prolonged conflict against the Jewish people, depriving innocent individuals of their right to education and peace. 

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 Teen Vogue’s Anti-Israel Narratives Amplify Hamas Talking Points first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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UK Outlet Caught Using Compromised Gaza Journalist Who Posed With Sinwar

The personal belongings of festival-goers are seen at the site of an attack on the Nova Festival by Hamas terrorists from Gaza, near Israel’s border with the Gaza Strip, in southern Israel, Oct. 12, 2023. Photo: REUTERS/Ronen Zvulun

Media outlets should know by now that when it comes to hiring Gaza freelancers — caution is advised.

As HonestReporting has repeatedly exposed, the vast majority of foreign media journalists in the Gaza Strip are deeply compromised — some receive annual awards from Hamas and others have personal connections to the terrorists.

One of them is Hassan Eslaiah, whose memorable photo with former Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar circulated online after we exposed he had infiltrated into Israel on October 7 and documented atrocities in Israeli kibbutzes.

This was enough for AP and CNN to cut ties with the so-called journalist immediately. But Sky News, it seems, didn’t bother checking his background when it recently hired him to work on a story for the network, as reported last week by Ynet News.

The network’s explanation was meant to absolve responsibility but instead revealed its low journalistic standards: the hiring was done through a third party, an independent production company.

It would have gone unnoticed had it not been for Eslaiah’s social media activity, where he posted a photo of himself with those he had covered — a United Nations team on a mine-clearing mission.

Everyone in the industry recognized him, diplomats complained, the UN was embarrassed, and Sky News had to apologize and shamefully admit that they had no idea who was working for the network in one of the most sensitive locations in the Middle East.

And it’s not like Eslaiah was unemployed until then: Last month his footage of the appalling handover of Israeli hostage Arbel Yehud was heavily used by local and international media.

Many questions arise: How did this happen? Who are the editors-in-charge in Sky News who thought it possible to delegate stories without knowing to whom? Will they be reprimanded? Will the network pay Eslaiah? Is there any other way to cover stories in Gaza without using compromised journalists?

Admittedly, Sky News said it won’t use Eslaiah’s material. But what’s going to happen in a year or two? When a new boss arrives and demands a good story from Gaza that only “journalists” like Eslaiah can have access to?

Media outlets should have a blacklist of those in the region who cannot be considered professional journalists.

If they really care about the truth, they should think twice before hiring freelancers in Gaza, and Google the name of each individual who promises professional coverage from the terror-ruled enclave.

Chances are they will land on an HonestReporting expose proving why such individuals should not be providing services to any respectable foreign media outlet.

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 UK Outlet Caught Using Compromised Gaza Journalist Who Posed With Sinwar first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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