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News Agency Lies About UN Data, Promoting New Blood Libel
The United Nations logo is seen at the 2019 United Nations Climate Action Summit at UN headquarters in New York, U.S., September 23, 2019. REUTERS/Lucas Jackson
United Press International (UPI) boasts “a history of reliable reporting dating back to 1907,” and praises itself as “a credible source for the most important stories of the day.”
But UPI’s recent coverage demonizing Israeli settlers with falsely reported United Nations figures indicates that the operative word in this self-congratulatory celebration of reliability and credibility is “history.”
Instead of supplying reliable and credible reporting about the most important stories of the day, UPI debased its once venerable operation with a fabrication propping up a modern day blood libel.
Thus, in his March 24 article, UPI’s Adam Schrader falsely stated that according to United Nations data, Israeli settlers are responsible for most of the 199 Palestinians killed in the West Bank from Jan. 1, 2023, until Hamas started a brutal war against Israel on Oct. 7, 2023 (“German Foreign Ministry Condemns Illegal Israeli settlements“).
Schrader fabricated: “Before the war broke out in October, 199 Palestinians were killed in the West Bank throughout 2023 – largely at the hands of illegal Israeli settlers, data from the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs shows.” [Emphasis added.]
In fact, the UN’s own data says no such thing. Schrader’s assertion about OCHA’s casualty data, available here, is absolutely false. After selecting the dates of Jan. 1, 2023 through Oct. 6, 2023 (before the start of the war on Oct. 7), along with the West Bank region, and filtering perpetrator as “Israeli civilian settler,” OCHA’s data reveals that seven fatalities out of a total of 199 — or 3.5 percent of West Bank Palestinian fatalities — were killed by Israeli civilian settlers. Does UPI consider 3.5 percent “largely”?
According to OCHA’s own data, Israeli settlers killed seven Palestinians, including those who were perpetrators carrying out attacks against Israelis when they were killed.
Moreover, virtually all of the West Bank Palestinians killed by Israeli civilians were killed as they attempted to carry out attacks against Israeli civilians.
Thus, such deaths underscore Palestinian — and not Israeli settler — violence. Significantly, OCHA’s definitions underneath the data chart acknowledge:
Incidents involving Israeli settlers: includes attacks and alleged attacks by Israeli settlers, as well as incidents involving access prevention, and clashes following the entry of Israeli settlers into Palestinian communities. It also includes Palestinians killed or injured during attacks or alleged attacks they perpetrated against Israeli settlers. [Bold added.]
Lacking transparency, OCHA does not publicly share the details of each incident, making it impossible to verify the circumstances of each of the reported deaths. Nevertheless, B’Tselem, an Israeli NGO adamantly opposed to settlements, does provide identifying details.
Of the eight West Bank Palestinians B’Tselem names as killed by Israeli civilians in 2023 prior to the war, six were carrying out attacks — some of them fatal — against Israelis when they were killed.
Elisha Anteman, 17, murdered by a Palestinian terrorist in Eli in June 2023. An Israeli civilian on the scene subsequently killed the Palestinian assailant, who had managed to murder four (Photo courtesy of family).
According to B’Tselem, Muhmannad Falah ‘Abdallah Shihadah, was “[f]atally shot by an Israeli civilian after he and another Hamas military wing operative shot and wounded the settlement security guard, and then fired at Israeli civilians, killing four, including two minors, and wounding three others.”
Reuters details Shihadah’s murderous June 20 attack outside a hummus restaurant (“Palestinian gunmen kill 4 Israelis in West Bank“).
Then there was ‘Alaa Khalil ‘Al Qeisiyah, “Fatally shot by an Israeli settler after entering the settlement’s limits and, according to the military, approaching settlers holding a knife” (“Palestinian Armed With Knife Shot Dead at Israeli Settlement in West Bank, IDF Says.“).
B’Tselem also lists that ‘Abd al-Karim Badi’a ‘Abd al-Karim Sheikh was “[f]atally shot by an Israeli settler after, according to the military, he entered the settlement armed with knives and explosive devices.” The Times of Israel reported that Sheikh hurled two IEDs, one of which exploded, before he was shot dead (“Palestinian shot dead after allegedly entering West Bank farm with knives, IEDs“).
Similarly, B’Tselem find that Karam ‘Al Ahmad Salman was “Fatally shot by settlement security guards when, according to the guards, he tried to enter the settlement.” The Times of Israel reported he was armed with a gun (“Armed Palestinian shot dead by guard near West Bank settlement, IDF says“).
B’Tselem also notes that Tareq ‘Odeh Yusef M’aali tried to stab an Israeli, and Sanad Muhammad ‘Othman Samamrah managed to do so, moderately wounding his victim.
In a separate error, Schrader mistakenly cited “borders for Israel and Palestine established in 1967.” Presumably, he was referring to the armistice lines (not borders), which were in place from 1949 to 1967, separating Israel from the Jordanian-controlled West Bank and the Egyptian-controlled Gaza Strip.
There have never been what Schrader calls “borders for Israel and Palestine.” Israel gained control of the West Bank from Jordan and the Gaza Strip from Egypt in 1967 as a result of the Six-Day War, which was imposed upon it. Those territories remained under Israeli control from 1967 until the Jewish state withdrew from areas of the West Bank as part of the Oslo Accords in the 1990s, giving Palestinians authority over parts of the West Bank for the very first time in history.
Later, in 2005, Israel withdrew entirely and unilaterally from the Gaza Strip, and Palestinians gained control of the coastal territory for the very first time then as well.
UPI’s woeful blood libel, completely detached both from reality and its own source, appeared in multiple McClatchy newspapers including Miami Herald, The Telegraph (Macon), The Bellingham Herald, Tacoma News Tribune, The Sun News, The Bradenton Herald, The Modesto Bee, Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Idaho Statesmen, San Luis Opisbo Tribune, The Island Packet, The Herald-Sun (Durham) and The Wichita Eagle.
CAMERA contacted senior leadership at both UPI and McClatchy about Schrader’s fabrication of UN data and the false charges of killings carried out by settlers, which was not responded to for several days.
“UPI has … stood at the cutting edge of newsgathering practices,” recounts its website.
The news agency’s 2007 centennial anniversary post adds: “Today, side by side with many of the oldest and emerging media giants, UPI faces a new technological frontier with a passion to preserve the best of journalistic practices while engaging a citizenry of lay reporters, photographers, and videographers, and a plethora of sources to publish and receive information.”
More than a dozen years later, UPI has failed to preserve ethical journalistic practices, introducing a novel newsgathering method: lying about its sources to support a predetermined narrative vilifying Jews and Israel.
Update: On March 31, following the publication of the original CAMERA post, UPI revised its wording to reflect the fact that the United Nations has found that seven Palestinians were killed in incidents involving settlers, and not nearly 200 as Adam Schrader had previously reported.
But the amended wording is itself a gross fabrication, falsely claiming that the UN found that at least seven were “murdered” by Israeli settlers, as if assailants killed while carrying out attacks are “murdered.” The new fallacious language is: “Before the war broke out in October, 199 Palestinians were killed by Israelis in the West Bank throughout 2023 — including at least seven murdered by illegal Israeli settlers, data from the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs shows.”
The United Nations made no assertion about murders, and qualified, without providing any breakdown, that the incidents include “Palestinians killed or injured during attacks or alleged attacks they perpetrated against Israeli settlers.” Instead of coming clean, the UPI buried itself into a deeper pit of embarrassing unprofessionalism and partisanship. E.W. Scripps, the editor who founded the United Press Association in 1907, and who practiced journalism according to the motto “Give light and the people will find their own way,” would surely not recognize UPI were he to see the depths to which it has sunk today.
Tamar Sternthal is the director of CAMERA’s Israel Office. A version of this article previously appeared on the CAMERA website.
The post News Agency Lies About UN Data, Promoting New Blood Libel first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Hamas Says No Interim Hostage Deal Possible Without Work Toward Permanent Ceasefire
Explosions send smoke into the air in Gaza, as seen from the Israeli side of the border, July 17, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Amir Cohen
The spokesperson for Hamas’s armed wing said on Friday that while the Palestinian terrorist group favors reaching an interim truce in the Gaza war, if such an agreement is not reached in current negotiations it could revert to insisting on a full package deal to end the conflict.
Hamas has previously offered to release all the hostages held in Gaza and conclude a permanent ceasefire agreement, and Israel has refused, Abu Ubaida added in a televised speech.
Arab mediators Qatar and Egypt, backed by the United States, have hosted more than 10 days of talks on a US-backed proposal for a 60-day truce in the war.
Israeli officials were not immediately available for comment on the eve of the Jewish Sabbath.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said in a statement on a call he had with Pope Leo on Friday that Israel‘s efforts to secure a hostage release deal and 60-day ceasefire “have so far not been reciprocated by Hamas.”
As part of the potential deal, 10 hostages held in Gaza would be returned along with the bodies of 18 others, spread out over 60 days. In exchange, Israel would release a number of detained Palestinians.
“If the enemy remains obstinate and evades this round as it has done every time before, we cannot guarantee a return to partial deals or the proposal of the 10 captives,” said Abu Ubaida.
Disputes remain over maps of Israeli army withdrawals, aid delivery mechanisms into Gaza, and guarantees that any eventual truce would lead to ending the war, said two Hamas officials who spoke to Reuters on Friday.
The officials said the talks have not reached a breakthrough on the issues under discussion.
Hamas says any agreement must lead to ending the war, while Netanyahu says the war will only end once Hamas is disarmed and its leaders expelled from Gaza.
Almost 1,650 Israelis and foreign nationals have been killed as a result of the conflict, including 1,200 killed in the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attack on southern Israel, according to Israeli tallies. Over 250 hostages were kidnapped during Hamas’s Oct. 7 onslaught.
Israel responded with an ongoing military campaign aimed at freeing the hostages and dismantling Hamas’s military and governing capabilities in neighboring Gaza.
The post Hamas Says No Interim Hostage Deal Possible Without Work Toward Permanent Ceasefire first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Iran Marks 31st Anniversary of AMIA Bombing by Slamming Argentina’s ‘Baseless’ Accusations, Blaming Israel
People hold images of the victims of the 1994 bombing attack on the Argentine Israeli Mutual Association (AMIA) community center, marking the 30th anniversary of the attack, in Buenos Aires, Argentina, July 18, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Irina Dambrauskas
Iran on Friday marked the 31st anniversary of the 1994 bombing of the Argentine Israelite Mutual Association (AMIA) Jewish community center in Buenos Aires by slamming Argentina for what it called “baseless” accusations over Tehran’s alleged role in the terrorist attack and accusing Israel of politicizing the atrocity to influence the investigation and judicial process.
The Iranian Foreign Ministry issued a statement on the anniversary of Argentina’s deadliest terrorist attack, which killed 85 people and wounded more than 300.
“While completely rejecting the accusations against Iranian citizens, the Islamic Republic of Iran condemns attempts by certain Argentine factions to pressure the judiciary into issuing baseless charges and politically motivated rulings,” the statement read.
“Reaffirming that the charges against its citizens are unfounded, the Islamic Republic of Iran insists on restoring their reputation and calls for an end to this staged legal proceeding,” it continued.
Last month, a federal judge in Argentina ordered the trial in absentia of 10 Iranian and Lebanese nationals suspected of orchestrating the attack in Buenos Aires.
The ten suspects set to stand trial include former Iranian and Lebanese ministers and diplomats, all of whom are subject to international arrest warrants issued by Argentina for their alleged roles in the terrorist attack.
In its statement on Friday, Iran also accused Israel of influencing the investigation to advance a political campaign against the Islamist regime in Tehran, claiming the case has been used to serve Israeli interests and hinder efforts to uncover the truth.
“From the outset, elements and entities linked to the Zionist regime [Israel] exploited this suspicious explosion, pushing the investigation down a false and misleading path, among whose consequences was to disrupt the long‑standing relations between the people of Iran and Argentina,” the Iranian Foreign Ministry said.
“Clear, undeniable evidence now shows the Zionist regime and its affiliates exerting influence on the Argentine judiciary to frame Iranian nationals,” the statement continued.
In April, lead prosecutor Sebastián Basso — who took over the case after the 2015 murder of his predecessor, Alberto Nisman — requested that federal Judge Daniel Rafecas issue national and international arrest warrants for Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei over his alleged involvement in the attack.
Since 2006, Argentine authorities have sought the arrest of eight Iranians — including former president Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, who died in 2017 — yet more than three decades after the deadly bombing, all suspects remain still at large.
In a post on X, the Delegation of Argentine Israelite Associations (DAIA), the country’s Jewish umbrella organization, released a statement commemorating the 31st anniversary of the bombing.
“It was a brutal attack on Argentina, its democracy, and its rule of law,” the group said. “At DAIA, we continue to demand truth and justice — because impunity is painful, and memory is a commitment to both the present and the future.”
31 años del atentado a la AMIA – DAIA. 31 años sin justicia.
El 18 de julio de 1994, un atentado terrorista dejó 85 personas muertas y más de 300 heridas. Fue un ataque brutal contra la Argentina, su democracia y su Estado de derecho.
Desde la DAIA, seguimos exigiendo verdad y… pic.twitter.com/kV2ReGNTIk
— DAIA (@DAIAArgentina) July 18, 2025
Despite Argentina’s longstanding belief that Lebanon’s Shiite Hezbollah terrorist group carried out the devastating attack at Iran’s request, the 1994 bombing has never been claimed or officially solved.
Meanwhile, Tehran has consistently denied any involvement and refused to arrest or extradite any suspects.
To this day, the decades-long investigation into the terrorist attack has been plagued by allegations of witness tampering, evidence manipulation, cover-ups, and annulled trials.
In 2006, former prosecutor Nisman formally charged Iran for orchestrating the attack and Hezbollah for carrying it out.
Nine years later, he accused former Argentine President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner — currently under house arrest on corruption charges — of attempting to cover up the crime and block efforts to extradite the suspects behind the AMIA atrocity in return for Iranian oil.
Nisman was killed later that year, and to this day, both his case and murder remain unresolved and under ongoing investigation.
The alleged cover-up was reportedly formalized through the memorandum of understanding signed in 2013 between Kirchner’s government and Iranian authorities, with the stated goal of cooperating to investigate the AMIA bombing.
The post Iran Marks 31st Anniversary of AMIA Bombing by Slamming Argentina’s ‘Baseless’ Accusations, Blaming Israel first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Jordan Reveals Muslim Brotherhood Operating Vast Illegal Funding Network Tied to Gaza Donations, Political Campaigns
Murad Adailah, the head of Jordan’s Muslim Brotherhood, attends an interview with Reuters in Amman, Jordan, Sept. 7, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Jehad Shelbak
The Muslim Brotherhood, one of the Arab world’s oldest and most influential Islamist movements, has been implicated in a wide-ranging network of illegal financial activities in Jordan and abroad, according to a new investigative report.
Investigations conducted by Jordanian authorities — along with evidence gathered from seized materials — revealed that the Muslim Brotherhood raised tens of millions of Jordanian dinars through various illegal activities, the Jordan news agency (Petra) reported this week.
With operations intensifying over the past eight years, the report showed that the group’s complex financial network was funded through various sources, including illegal donations, profits from investments in Jordan and abroad, and monthly fees paid by members inside and outside the country.
The report also indicated that the Muslim Brotherhood has taken advantage of the war in Gaza to raise donations illegally.
Out of all donations meant for Gaza, the group provided no information on where the funds came from, how much was collected, or how they were distributed, and failed to work with any international or relief organizations to manage the transfers properly.
Rather, the investigations revealed that the Islamist network used illicit financial mechanisms to transfer funds abroad.
According to Jordanian authorities, the group gathered more than JD 30 million (around $42 million) over recent years.
With funds transferred to several Arab, regional, and foreign countries, part of the money was allegedly used to finance domestic political campaigns in 2024, as well as illegal activities and cells.
In April, Jordan outlawed the Muslim Brotherhood, the country’s most vocal opposition group, and confiscated its assets after members of the Islamist movement were found to be linked to a sabotage plot.
The movement’s political arm in Jordan, the Islamic Action Front, became the largest political grouping in parliament after elections last September, although most seats are still held by supporters of the government.
Opponents of the group, which is banned in most Arab countries, label it a terrorist organization. However, the movement claims it renounced violence decades ago and now promotes its Islamist agenda through peaceful means.
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