Connect with us

RSS

Media Outlets Stand By Reporters Who Cooperated With Hamas

Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar looks on as Palestinian Hamas supporters take part in an anti-Israel rally over tension in Jerusalem’s Al-Aqsa mosque, in Gaza City, Oct. 1, 2022. Photo: REUTERS/Mohammed Salem

An AFP staff photographer aimed to appease Hamas by speaking to a “Day of Loyalty to the Palestinian Journalists” event organized by the terrorist group, the news agency’s global news director Phil Chetwynd told HonestReporting last week.

Journalists working for foreign media outlets in Gaza have participated in Hamas’ annual loyalty event hosted by the terror group’s Government Media Office, with the stated aim of aligning the media with Hamas’ agenda, an HonestReporting investigation revealed.

Our report unveiled the disturbing relationship between Gaza’s rulers and the journalists tasked with covering them, calling into question their objectivity and the ethical standards of their media outlets — the Associated Press, AFP, Reuters, and The New York Times.

“Mohammed Abed is an award-winning staff photographer at AFP who has always worked according to the agency’s published rules and ethics charters,” Chetwynd said.

“He did not attend the ‘Day of Loyalty to the Palestinian Journalists’ event in 2021. However, he agreed to say a few words in a video, as the Hamas-controlled government press office effectively regulated media work in Gaza. In the video, he thanked the government press office in general terms for their support of journalists,” the AFP global news director continued.

“We have journalists who work in many difficult locations around the world and in all these locations it is incumbent on them to maintain cordial and professional relations with the organization that controls the territory in which they work. It would be dishonest try to twist these anodyne words into a pledge of support for Hamas.”

While the AP and New York Times did not respond to a request for comment, a Reuters spokesperson defended the news agency’s journalists who participated in the Hamas event.

“We stand by our coverage of Gaza and our team, who operate within the Thomson Reuters Trust Principles,” the spokesman said.

However, those principles appeared to forbid joining an event organized by a terrorist organization to encourage loyalty.

“Customers across the world depend on us to provide them with reliable and objective news and information,” the Principles state. “This means that we have a special need to safeguard our independence and integrity and avoid any bias which may stem from control by specific individuals or interests.”

Here are the highlights of our expose:

AP’s staff photographer Hatem Moussa delivered a video address at Hamas’ 2014 Loyalty Day event. It appears that his message was displayed on the same screen as the message of Abu Ubaida, the terror group’s military wing spokesperson. It was also published in propaganda style by Hamas’ official news agency.
AP’s photographer Fatima Shbair and AFP’s Mohammed Baba spoke in a promotional video for the 2021 event, in which they were also honored by Hamas for receiving international awards.
Two journalists were honored in the 2021 event as Hamas media office’s “work partners:” Yasser Qudih, who infiltrated into Israel on October 7 and recently won the Pulitzer Prize with Reuters’ photography staff, and The New York Times’s photographer Samar abu Elouf, who recently won the prestigious Polk Award.
At the 2022 event, two journalists were honored for serving on the judging panel of the Government Media Office’s media contest: Reuters cameraman Fadi Shanaa and AP’s Adel Hana, whom we exposed for teaching Hamas’ media courses.
Other journalists were honored in 2021 and 2022 for winning international awards. These included Reuters photographer Ibraheem Abu Mustafa, who recently also won the 2024 Staff Photography Pulitzer, and AP photographer Khalil Hamra.
In 2022, the terror group also gave monetary awards to two journalists who were exposed by HonestReporting for their infiltration into Israel and their links to Hamas — Hassan Eslaiah, who worked for AP and CNN, and Ashraf Amra who worked for Reuters.

HonestReporting is 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 Outlets Stand By Reporters Who Cooperated With Hamas first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

Continue Reading

RSS

US House Members Ask Marco Rubio to Bar Turkey From Rejoining F-35 Program

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio attends a cabinet meeting at the White House in Washington, DC, US, April 10, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Nathan Howard

A bipartisan coalition of more than 40 US lawmakers is pressing Secretary of State Marco Rubio to prevent Turkey from rejoining the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter program, citing ongoing national security concerns and violations of US law.

Members of Congress on Thursday warned that lifting existing sanctions or readmitting Turkey to the US F-35 fifth-generation fighter program would “jeopardize the integrity of F-35 systems” and risk exposing sensitive US military technology to Russia. The letter pointed to Ankara’s 2017 purchase of the Russian S-400 surface-to-air missile system, despite repeated US warnings, as the central reason Turkey was expelled from the multibillion-dollar fighter jet program in 2019.

“The S-400 poses a direct threat to US aircraft, including the F-16 and F-35,” the lawmakers wrote. “If operated alongside these platforms, it risks exposing sensitive military technology to Russian intelligence.”

The group of signatories, spanning both parties, stressed that Turkey still possesses the Russian weapons systems and has shown “no willingness to comply with US law.” They urged Rubio and the Trump administration to uphold the Countering American Adversaries Through Sanctions Act (CAATSA) and maintain Ankara’s exclusion from the F-35 program until the S-400s are fully removed.

The letter comes after Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan claimed during a NATO summit in June that Ankara and Washington have begun discussing Turkey’s readmission into the program.

Lawmakers argued that reversing course now would undermine both US credibility and allied confidence in American defense commitments. They also warned it could disrupt development of the next-generation fighter jet announced by the administration earlier this year.

“This is not a partisan issue,” the letter emphasized. “We must continue to hold allies and adversaries alike accountable when their actions threaten US interests.”

Continue Reading

RSS

US Lawmakers Urge Treasury to Investigate Whether Irish Bill Targeting Israel Violates Anti-Boycott Law

A pro-Hamas demonstration in Ireland led by nationalist party Sinn Fein. Photo: Reuters/Clodagh Kilcoyne

A group of US lawmakers is calling on the Treasury Department to investigate and potentially penalize Ireland over proposed legislation targeting Israeli goods, warning that the move could trigger sanctions under longstanding US anti-boycott laws.

In a letter sent on Thursday to US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, 16 Republican members of Congress expressed “serious concerns” about Ireland’s recent legislative push to ban trade with territories under Israeli administration, including the West Bank, Gaza, East Jerusalem, and the Golan Heights.

The letter, spearheaded by Rep. Claudia Tenney (R-NY), called for the US to “send a clear signal” that any attempts to economically isolate Israel will “carry consequences.”

The Irish measure, introduced by Foreign Affairs and Trade Minister Simon Harris, seeks to prohibit the import of goods and services originating from what the legislation refers to as “occupied Palestinian territories,” including Israeli communities in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. Supporters say the bill aligns with international law and human rights principles, while opponents, including the signatories of the letter, characterize it as a direct extension of the boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) movement, which seeks to isolate Israel as a step toward the destruction of the world’s lone Jewish state.

Some US lawmakers have also described the Irish bill as an example of “antisemitic hate” that could risk hurting relations between Dublin and Washington.

“Such policies not only promote economic discrimination but also create legal uncertainty for US companies operating in Ireland,” the lawmakers wrote in this week’s letter, urging Bessent to determine whether Ireland’s actions qualify as participation in an “unsanctioned international boycott” under Section 999 of the Internal Revenue Code, also known as the Ribicoff Amendment.

Under that statute, the Treasury Department is required to maintain a list of countries that pressure companies to comply with international boycotts not sanctioned by the US. Inclusion on the list carries tax-reporting burdens and possible penalties for American firms and individuals doing business in those nations.

“If the criteria are met, Ireland should be added to the boycott list,” the letter said, arguing that such a step would help protect US companies from legal exposure and reaffirm American opposition to economic efforts aimed at isolating Israel.

Legal experts have argued that if the Irish bill becomes law, it could chase American capital out of the country while also hurting companies that do business with Ireland. Under US law, it is illegal for American companies to participate in boycotts of Israel backed by foreign governments. Several US states have also gone beyond federal restrictions to pass separate measures that bar companies from receiving state contracts if they boycott Israel.

Ireland has been one of the fiercest critics of Israel on the international stage since the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, massacre across southern Israel, amid the ensuing war in Gaza, leading the Jewish state to shutter its embassy in Dublin.

Last year, Ireland officially recognized a Palestinian state, a decision that Israel described as a “reward for terrorism.”

Continue Reading

RSS

US Families File Lawsuit Accusing UNRWA of Supporting Hamas, Hezbollah

A truck, marked with United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) logo, crosses into Egypt from Gaza, at the Rafah border crossing between Egypt and the Gaza Strip, during a temporary truce between Hamas and Israel, in Rafah, Egypt, Nov. 27, 2023. Photo: REUTERS/Amr Abdallah Dalsh

American families of victims of Hamas and Hezbollah attacks have filed a lawsuit against the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, accusing the organization of violating US antiterrorism laws by providing material support to the Islamist terror groups behind the deadly assaults.

Last week, more than 200 families filed a lawsuit in a Washington, DC district court accusing the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) of violating US antiterrorism laws by providing funding and support to Hamas and Hezbollah, both designated as foreign terrorist organizations.

The lawsuit alleges that UNRWA employs staff with direct ties to the Iran-backed terror group, including individuals allegedly involved in carrying out attacks against the Jewish state.

However, UNRWA has firmly denied the allegations, labeling them as “baseless” and condemning the lawsuit as “meritless, absurd, dangerous, and morally reprehensible.”

According to the organization, the lawsuit is part of a wider campaign of “misinformation and lawfare” targeting its work in the Gaza Strip, where it says Palestinians are enduring “mass, deliberate and forced starvation.”

The UN agency reports that more than 150,000 donors across the United States have supported its programs providing food, medical aid, education, and trauma assistance in the war-torn enclave amid the ongoing conflict.

In a press release, UNRWA USA affirmed that it will continue its humanitarian efforts despite facing legal challenges aimed at undermining its work.

“Starvation does not pause for politics. Neither will we,” the statement read.

Last year, Israeli security documents revealed that of UNRWA’s 13,000 employees in Gaza, 440 were actively involved in Hamas’s military operations, with 2,000 registered as Hamas operatives.

According to these documents, at least nine UNRWA employees took part directly in the terror group’s Oct. 7, 2023, invasion of and massacre across southern Israel.

Israeli officials also uncovered a large Hamas data center beneath UNRWA headquarters, with cables running through the facility above, and found that Hamas also stored weapons in other UNRWA sites.

The UN agency has also aligned with Hamas in efforts against the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), an Israeli and US-backed program that delivers aid directly to Palestinians, blocking Hamas from diverting supplies for terror activities and selling them at inflated prices.

These Israeli intelligence documents also revealed that a senior Hamas leader, killed in an Israeli strike in September 2024, had served as the head of the UNRWA teachers’ union in Lebanon, where Lebanon is based,

UNRWA’s education programs have been found by IMPACT-se, an international organization that monitors global education, to contribute to the radicalization of younger generations of Palestinians.

Continue Reading

Copyright © 2017 - 2023 Jewish Post & News