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Once Again, CNN Distorts Gaza War and Ignores Israel’s Efforts to Protect Civilians
As CAMERA has repeatedly documented, there is a pattern of CNN reports lobbing horrific allegations at Israel, based on exceedingly thin evidence and lots of insinuation. It’s a standard, or practice, akin to tabloid journalism — a standard certainly not appropriate for serious journalism nor serious accusations of war crimes.
The latest example comes from a February 13 article entitled, “‘We were walking in water, sand, mud’: Palestinian women describe terror of 12-mile escape on foot from Gaza City,” by Abeer Salman and Mohammad Al Sawalhi.
The gist of the story, based on the claims of four women in Gaza, is that they and other Gazans were besieged and almost buried alive in a building in the al-Rimal neighborhood of Gaza City by Israeli forces before the women and children were forced to walk eight hours south to Deir al-Balah while the men were “abducted.”
As is all too common in such CNN articles, there is heavy use of suggestive language implying Israeli cruelty.
For example, the authors repeatedly imply that Israeli forces were shooting civilians without explicitly saying so. For example, they quote one of the women saying, “We opened the door for them and asked them not to shoot. We told them we only have kids, but they kept shooting.” Another supposedly told CNN that, “Israeli forces were firing towards them as they walked” after leaving the building in al-Rimal, while a third also supposedly told CNN that “they could see Israeli missile boats off the coast and were fearful they would be fired on.”
Yet, despite all this apparent shooting, the article never says whether anyone was actually killed or wounded. Surely the journalists would have mentioned it had any of the civilians actually been shot by Israeli forces in these instances. Either Israeli forces are murderous, but terrible, shooters, or something else is going on.
In a similar apparent effort to depict Israeli forces as cruel, the authors insinuate that the IDF was trying to demolish buildings with civilians inside. One of the Gazans from the al-Rimal building is quoted saying, “We heard the houses collapsing on the heads of people” and that “[t]hey were about to bury us as well, but we begged them to let us out.”
The evil Israelis, it’s implied, were knowingly going to bury them alive inside the building.
But this depiction makes little sense when one looks more closely at the order of events depicted by the article:
Israeli troops arrived at the building and told those sheltering inside to leave, explaining it would be “blown up within 10 minutes,” according to interviewee Hoda Harb.
According to interviewee Israa Hassan Ahmed al-Ashkar, the Gazans “did not want to leave the building, but the Israeli military began intensive bombing in the immediate area. They ‘destroyed the building entrance and came upstairs…’”
Then, according to al-Ashkar, “We heard the houses collapsing on the heads of people,” she claimed, and then the ruins of the buildings were bulldozed.
Finally, said al-Ashkar, “They were about to bury us as well, but we begged them to let us out.”
Read together, we’re being told that Israeli troops wanted to evacuate those taking shelter (they “told those sheltering inside to leave”) but also wanted to bury them alive inside (“They were about to bury us as well”) — and this was a building which the soldiers were themselves inside of (“[They]…came upstairs”). We’re also told that the Israeli forces wanted to blow up the building within 10 minutes, but before that, they had enough time to blow up and bulldoze other buildings.
It’s bad journalistic writing by authors either incapable of crafting a clear, coherent story, or intentionally trying to obscure the story in an effort to mislead readers.
The holes in the story would perhaps make more sense had the authors provided additional relevant context.
Consider these three crucial bits of context that should have been mentioned in the article, but weren’t. Each would have provided readers with important information to understand what might have actually happened.
1) Al-Rimal neighborhood is a known Hamas “nest of terror.”
The CNN authors carefully avoid the important question of who, exactly, the Israeli forces were shooting at; readers are only told they were shooting. The omitted detail that likely would have shed light on this question is that al-Rimal neighborhood is well-known for being a “nest of terror.”
From the very beginning of the war, Israeli officials were identifying al-Rimal as one of the key “terror hubs” (see, e.g., here and here). Since then, Israel has provided substantial evidence of terrorists having embedded themselves in and underneath civilian infrastructure.
In mid-November alone, Israeli troops located approximately 35 tunnel shafts in the area, along with numerous military posts and weapons in residential areas. In early December, troops found terror infrastructure and a large number of weapons and military equipment inside Al-Azhar University, along with a tunnel running from the campus to a school a kilometer away. A week later, troops found Hamas terrorists hiding inside two schools in the al-Rimal neighborhood. Just days later, Israeli forces killed and captured terrorists in yet another school in al-Rimal, including one who had participated in the October 7 massacre.
Shortly after, the IDF uncovered the massive amount of Hamas terrorist infrastructure in Palestine Square, located in al-Rimal, including command and control centers in buildings and terror tunnels located amongst residential buildings, commercial buildings, and even a school for deaf children. In another incident, Israeli soldiers were saved from an ambush by a terrorist lying in wait inside of a building by an Oketz Unit canine named Toy, who bravely neutralized the terrorist.
In fact, based on one map produced by the IDF, one of the buildings in which they found a terror tunnel back in December was located just a few blocks away from the building that is the subject of CNN’s article.
Several blocks in the other direction, Hamas terrorists had barricaded themselves inside the Blue Beach Hotel, launching missiles at Israeli forces, in early January. The IDF then found seven tunnel shafts inside the hotel, as well as a large quantity of weapons and drones. Given the estimates about how many buildings have contained terrorists, terrorist equipment, or terrorist infrastructure, it is almost guaranteed that even more was found in the vicinity as Israeli forces approached the building in question.
Despite the abundant evidence of Hamas having systematically embedded itself in civilian structures in the area, the journalists demonstrate zero interest in this crucial context. The authors include only a generalized, boilerplate statement from the IDF about operating against “Hamas strongholds” – hidden halfway through the article – as if that absolves them of their responsibility to investigate and report about this critical aspect of the story themselves.
But if it turns out, as seems highly likely, that those incidents of “shooting” referenced by the Gazan women occurred because there were Hamas or other Palestinian terrorists in the vicinity, then the authors’ decision to omit this context becomes indefensible.
2) Hamas has been repeatedly caught exploiting civilian shelters.
A related piece of context, omitted by Salman and Al Sawalhi, is the documented pattern of Palestinian terrorists exploiting civilian shelters, like the building in question, for military purposes in Gaza. Among the incidents that have been documented during the current war:
A school in Jabaliya, serving as a civilian shelter, in which troops of the 551st Brigade located weapons belonging to Hamas terrorists. (Times of Israel, December 21)
In northern Gaza, a building in which civilians were sheltering also contained a large cache of weapons used by Hamas, including “explosive belts adapted for children,” “dozens of mortars,” and “hundreds of grenades.” The building was notably located near a school, a mosque, and a clinic. (Times of Israel, December 24; see also images of the weaponry found at IDF, December 24)
In the Sheikh Radwan neighborhood of Gaza City, Hamas terrorists were found in a school serving as a shelter. A cache of weapons was also found inside, including assault rifles, grenades, and other explosive devices. (Times of Israel, December 24)
In al-Bureij, troops of the 188th Brigade were fired on by terrorists hiding inside of a school sheltering civilians. (IDF, December 30 (see also video here))
One is left to wonder whether something similar occurred at the building in al-Rimal. Were the explosions nearby because the IDF was fighting terrorists? Did the IDF demolish the building because there was terrorist infrastructure inside? Were terrorists using the building for military purposes in some other way?
It would amount to journalistic malpractice if the authors did not even bother to ask the witnesses about this. Assuming they did, why, then, would they not mention this in the article? Given the article includes the allegation that the Israeli forces “abducted” the men in the building, don’t the journalists have a responsibility to investigate why they were detained?
3) The IDF had been urging them to evacuate for nearly four months.
Israel had been calling on Gazan civilians to evacuate northern Gaza, including al-Rimal neighborhood, for nearly four months. As far back as October 13, when conditions were much better, the IDF was “call[ing] for the evacuation of all civilians of Gaza City from their homes southwards for their own safety and protection and move to the area south of the Wadi Gaza…” In that same announcement, the IDF cited the exact reasons mentioned above: “Hamas terrorists are hiding in Gaza City inside tunnels underneath houses and inside buildings populated with innocent Gazan civilians.”
But the IDF was warning residents of al-Rimal neighborhood more specifically even earlier than that. The IDF was already sending warnings to residents in the area to evacuate as early as October 10, as the neighborhood was a known “power base” for Hamas and thus was one of the areas targeted by airstrikes early in the war.
Perhaps those CNN spoke to simply were simply unable to evacuate at any point during those four months for one reason or another. But why did the authors not mention that the IDF had been trying to get civilians to leave the area for a long time for the stated reason of getting them out of harm’s way?
All of this omitted context, and all of these unexplored questions, point to either exceedingly lazy or intensely biased journalism. Neither is a good look for the network, which is more than capable of producing excellent journalism.
David M. Litman is a Research Analyst at the Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting and Analysis (CAMERA), where a version of this article first appeared.
The post Once Again, CNN Distorts Gaza War and Ignores Israel’s Efforts to Protect Civilians first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Kosher Restaurant in Madrid Targeted in Arson Attempt
People demonstrate in the city of Santander, Spain, under the motto ‘Let’s stop the genocide in Gaza,’ on Jan. 20, 2024. Photo: Joaquin Gomez Sastre/NurPhoto via Reuters Connect
A kosher restaurant in central Madrid was targeted in an attempted arson attack, prompting a police investigation, as Spain continues to face a rise in antisemitic incidents since the outbreak of the Israel-Hamas war in 2023.
On Tuesday night, an unknown individual entered the Rimmon Kosher restaurant in the Spanish capital and “sprayed a liquid with a strong gasoline smell on the entrance, intending to set fire and burn down the premises,” according to a joint statement from the Jewish Community of Madrid (CJM) and the Federation of Jewish Communities of Spain (FCJE).
Before the police arrived, the attacker fled the scene. However, the restaurant staff’s quick response prevented the fire from being lit.
In a press release on Wednesday, CJM and FCJE condemned the foiled attack as “an antisemitic act aimed at causing harm, targeting public spaces frequented by the Jewish community, and terrorizing its members.”
“This is an act driven by hatred, with a vile and brutal intent, that threatens coexistence, freedom, and tolerance — values that have always defined the citizens of Madrid,” the statement continued.
Comunicado de la Comunidad Judía de Madrid ante el intento de incendio del restaurante Rimmon Kosher de Madrid. pic.twitter.com/SESEm9J8ay
— Comunidad Judía de Madrid (@cjm_es) March 5, 2025
As of now, a police investigation is underway, with authorities focused on tracking down the perpetrator and determining the motive behind their actions.
“We hope the perpetrator’s identity will be determined soon and that this person will be arrested quickly,” CJM and FCJE addedt. “In the meantime, we are ready to cooperate with the authorities and the restaurant owners in any way needed.”
The Israeli Embassy in Spain also condemned Tuesday’s attack on the kosher restaurant, near the main synagogue, and expressed full support for the staff, owners, and customers of the establishment, as well as solidarity with the Jewish community of Madrid.
“We are facing yet another case that shows how hate-inciting rhetoric leads to violence,” the embassy posted on X/Twitter. “We fully trust that the authorities will act decisively to prevent violent and antisemitic incidents from recurring in Spain.”
La Embajada de Israel en España condena enérgicamente el ataque perpetrado contra un restaurante casher en Madrid, próximo a la sinagoga principal.
Expresamos nuestro total apoyo al personal, propietarios y clientes del establecimiento, así como nuestra solidaridad con la… pic.twitter.com/4jTqZLq6CH
— Israel en España
(@IsraelinSpain) March 5, 2025
Since Hamas started the Gaza war with its invasion of and massacre across southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, Spain has been a fierce critic of the Jewish state.
In the aftermath of the Oct. 7 atrocities, Spain halted arms shipments from its own defense companies to Israel and launched a diplomatic campaign to curb the country’s military response. At the same time, several Spanish ministers in the country’s left-wing coalition government issued pro-Hamas statements and called for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza, with some falsely accusing Israel of “genocide.”
More recently, Spanish officials said they would not allow ships carrying arms for Israel to stop at its ports. In response, the US Federal Maritime Commission opened an investigation into whether Spain, a NATO ally, has been denying port entry to cargo vessels reportedly transporting US weapons to Jerusalem.
Additionally, Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez urged other members of the European Union to suspend the bloc’s free trade agreement with Israel over its military campaigns against Hamas in Gaza and the terrorist organization Hezbollah in Lebanon.
In May, Spain officially recognized a Palestinian state, claiming the move was accelerated by the Israel-Hamas war and would help foster a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Israeli officials described the decision as a “reward for terrorism.”
The post Kosher Restaurant in Madrid Targeted in Arson Attempt first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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‘Failure’: Larry Summers Slams Harvard University’s Response to Campus Antisemitism
Demonstrators take part in an “Emergency Rally: Stand With Palestinians Under Siege in Gaza,” amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas, at Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts, US, Oct. 14, 2023. Photo: REUTERS/Brian Snyder
Former Harvard University president Larry Summers said on Monday that the administration’s response to campus antisemitism remains unsatisfactory, echoing the concerns of Jewish civil rights activists who continue to demand progress from the Ivy League institution.
“Harvard continues its failure to effectively address antisemitism,” Summers posted on the X/Twitter social media platform. “Despite [current Harvard president Alan Garber’s] clear and strong personal moral commitment, he has lacked the will and/or leverage to effect the necessary large-scale change, and the Corporation has been ineffectual.”
The Harvard Corporation is the university’s highest governing body.
Summers went on to list several outrages to which Harvard has subjected its Jewish and pro-Israel students and faculty during this academic year — including the Center for Middle Eastern Studies (CMES) holding a panel on Israel’s military actions against terrorist groups in Lebanon in which antisemitic tropes were promoted, Dean Marla Frederick’s denouncing Israel’s founding as the nakba, and the university’s antisemitism task force keeping a professor who has downplayed the severity of Jew-hatred on campus as one of its members.
Summers noted as well that Harvard’s antisemitism task force, which a US federal lawmaker accused of being a farce contrived to manipulate the public’s opinion of the university, has not yet issued a final report containing its findings or recommendations for new policies for dealing with the issue despite having convened over a year ago.
“It is by the way shocking, and I think outrageous, that months after Harvard’s abject failures after Oct. 7, the task force hasn’t even reached a conclusion,” Summers continued. “Nor is there yet a basis for confidence that disruptions will be met with disciplinary consequences, especially in a number of professional schools that are redoubts of the far left.”
Harvard continues its failure to effectively address antisemitism.
Despite President Garber’s clear and strong personal moral commitment, he has lacked the will and/or leverage to effect the necessary large scale change, and the Corporation has been ineffectual.
— Lawrence H. Summers (@LHSummers) March 4, 2025
Summers’ statements come amid a challenging moment in the history of Harvard University, America’s oldest and arguably most prestigous institution of higher education. Since Hamas’s invasion of Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, Harvard has seen its law school student government issue a resolution which falsely accused Israel of genocide; its students quote terrorists during an “Apartheid Week” event held in April; and dozens of its students and faculty participated in an illegal pro-Hamas encampment attended by members of a group that had shared an antisemitic cartoon. Additionally, many Harvard students openly cheered Hamas’s Oct. 7 atrocities, which included sexual assault and child abduction, and a mob led by the president of the prestigious Harvard Law Review followed, surrounded, and intimidated a Jewish student, screaming “Shame! Shame! Shame!” into his ears.
After these incidents and more, Harvard fought tooth and nail to discredit lawsuits which alleged that its response to campus antisemitism amounted to the enabling of discriminatory behavior which violates federal civil rights law. Harvard eventually settled multiple complaints out of court, but at least one plaintiff, Harvard alumnus Shabbos Kestenbaum, refused to be a party to the agreements, arguing that they allowed the university to evade accountability for its alleged inaction.
Summers and Kestenbaum aren’t Harvard’s only critics in the Jewish community. On Monday, the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) issued a “Campus Report Card” in which Harvard’s antisemitism policies were given a “C” grade. ADL chief executive officer Jonathan Greenblatt said in a statement accompanying the report that every school assessed by the organization should have received an “A.”
“I said it last year, and I’ll say it again: every single campus should get an ‘A.’ This isn’t a high bar — this should be standard,” Greenblatt explained. “While many campuses have improved in ways that are encouraging and commendable, Jewish students still do not feel safe or included on too many campuses. The progress we’ve seen is evidence that change is possible — all university leaders should focus on addressing these very real challenges with real action.”
US President Donald Trump’s administration has vowed to crack down on campus antisemitism and pro-Hamas activity across the US.
In January, he issued a highly anticipated executive order aimed at combating campus antisemitism and holding pro-terror extremists accountable for the harassment of Jewish students, fulfilling a promise he made while campaigning for a second term in office.
Continuing work started during his first administration — when Trump issued Executive Order 13899 to ensure that civil rights law apply equally Jews — the “Additional Measures to Combat Antisemitism” calls for “using all appropriate legal tools to prosecute, remove, or otherwise … hold to account perpetrators of unlawful antisemitic harassment and violence.” The order also requires each government agency to write a report explaining how it can be of help in carrying out its enforcement.
Additionally, it initiates a full review of the explosion of campus antisemitism on US colleges across the country after Oct. 7, 2023, a convulsive moment in American history to which the previous presidential administration struggled to respond during the final year and a half of its tenure.
On Tuesday, Trump vowed to suspend federal funding to any educational institution that refuses to quell riotous demonstrations, a punitive measure which would fulfill his administration’s pledge to crack down on campus antisemitism and the pro-Hamas activists fostering it.
“All federal funding will stop for any college, school, or university that allows illegal protests,” Trump said in a statement posted on Truth Social, the social media platform he founded in 2022. “Agitators will be imprisoned/or permanently sent back to the country from which they came. American students will be permanently expelled or, depending on the crime, arrested.”
He continued, “No masks! Thank you for your attention to this matter.”
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.
The post ‘Failure’: Larry Summers Slams Harvard University’s Response to Campus Antisemitism first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Second Australian Nurse Charged Over Viral Video Threatening to Kill Israeli Patients
Members of the Jewish community and supporters gather for a protest rally against rising antisemitism at Martin Place in Sydney, Jan. 21, 2025. Photo: AAP Image/Steven Saphore via Reuters Connect
An Australian nurse working in a Sydney hospital has been arrested and charged after a viral video captured him making threats, stating he would refuse to treat Israeli patients and instead kill them.
This latest legal step comes as law enforcement works to combat a surge in antisemitic incidents across Australia, which the country’s spy chief has called his agency’s top priority.
After the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, invasion of and massacre across southern Israel, several Jewish sites in Australia have been relentlessly targeted with vandalism and even arson, especially in the past few months. In response, a New South Wales (NSW) police task force, Strike Force Pearl, was established to address the wave of hate crimes and rising antisemitism.
On Tuesday night, 27-year-old Ahmed Rashid Nadir was arrested and charged with federal offenses, including using a carriage service to menace, harass, or cause offense, as well as possession of a prohibited drug, NSW Police said in a statement.
The arrest follows an incident at Bankstown-Lidcombe Hospital in Sydney, in which Nadir and his fellow nurse, Sarah Abu Lebdeh, were seen in an online video posing as doctors and making inflammatory statements during a night-shift discussion with Israeli influencer Max Veifer.
The footage, which circulated widely, showed Lebdeh stating she would refuse to treat an Israeli patient and instead kill them, while Nadir used a throat-slitting gesture and claimed to have already killed many.
“It’s Palestine’s country, not your country, you piece of s—t,” Lebdeh told Veifer.
“One day your time will come, and you will die the most disgusting death,” she added in a sentence riddled with obscenities.
Last week, 26-year-old Lebdeh was arrested and charged with similar federal offenses, including threatening violence against a group and using a carriage service to threaten, menace, and harass, with a conviction potentially leading to up to 22 years in prison.
After reviewing patient records, the hospital found no evidence that Lebdeh or Nadir had harmed patients.
NSW’s Health Minister Ryan Park confirmed that both nurses had been suspended and would be permanently barred from employment within the state’s health system.
According to the NSW Police statement, both Lebdeh and Nadir were released on bail and are set to appear in court on March 19. Lebdeh has been prohibited from leaving Australia and using social media while her case proceeds.
The incident is one of the latest in a surge of antisemitic acts across Australia since the beginning of the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza in October 2023, with Jewish institutions targeted in arson attacks and businesses defaced.
Law enforcement in Sydney and Melbourne, home to the majority of Australia’s Jewish population, is actively investigating hate crimes, including the recent discovery of a trailer containing explosives and a list of potential Jewish targets.
Since the formation of Strike Force Pearl, the task force to combat antisemitism, in December, NSW Police Commissioner Karen Webb reported that 15 people have been arrested, and 78 charges have been filed.
“I must commend the work Strike Force Pearl detectives are doing to investigate, charge, and put these individuals before the courts,” Webb said in a statement. “There is a tremendous amount of dedication and hard work going into all these investigations.”
Last month, dozens of Australia’s leading Muslim groups and individuals defended the two nurses, accusing their critics of “hypocrisy” and “double standards and moral manipulation” in an open letter.
“This statement is not about defending inappropriate remarks. It is about pushing back against the double standards and moral manipulation at play while the mass killing of our brothers and sisters in Gaza is met with silence, dismissal, or complicity,” the letter said.
In response to the ongoing spike in antisemitism, Australia passed a new slate of hate crime laws last month which would, among other measures, imprison those who make terror threats or perform Nazi salutes.
In a Senate committee hearing last week, Mike Burgess, the director-general of the Australian Security Intelligence Organization (ASIO), the country’s domestic intelligence agency, said that antisemitism is now the agency’s top priority.
“In terms of threats to life, [antisemitism is] my agency’s number one priority because of the weight of incidents we’re seeing play out in this country,” Burgess told the Senate. “Antisemitism and significant antisemitism acts are prominent in our investigation caseload at this point in time.”
In a recent 2025 threat assessment declassified by ASIO, Burgess warned that the surge in antisemitic attacks across Australia could escalate, as extremists are increasingly self-radicalizing and “choose their own adventure” toward potential terrorist activity.
“Threats transitioned from harassment and intimidation to specific targeting of Jewish communities, places of worship, and prominent figures,” he said. “I am concerned these attacks have not yet plateaued.”
The post Second Australian Nurse Charged Over Viral Video Threatening to Kill Israeli Patients first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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