News coverage in the Martha’s Vineyard Times tends to stick to local concerns — labor negotiations between the Steamship Authority and the union that operates the ferry between the island and Cape Cod, the perennial shortage of “affordable” housing for year-round and seasonal workers, shark sightings.

For the past few weeks, though, the Times has been on a campaign against the Martha’s Vineyard Chabad after it hosted a Jewish cultural festival event featuring the singer Matisyahu.

Instead of writing about the festival, the newspaper highlighted a small anti-Israel protest against it. Then it ran another story focusing on a protester-participant, and a third story attacking the festival’s organizer.

One Times news article referred to Israel’s “brutal military campaign” and quoted a protester who said, “We are here to reject the presence of someone who performs and fundraises for the Israeli Occupation Forces and the AIPAC lobbying group, condones violence against the Palestinian people and land in the name of Jewish safety, and denies ongoing genocide.”

The onslaught of hostile coverage has generated a disappointed response from readers.

One of them, Jackie Mendez, took to the newspaper’s comments section. “What is Jewish culture? The MVTimes doesn’t care to explain. Instead, it chooses to give yet more time and space to the ignorance and hatred of Israel,” Mendez wrote. “This newspaper gave editorial space to this kind of rabid Jew-hatred.”

Another reader, Judith Hannan, a former columnist for the Times, wrote in a letter to the editor, “The main issue I think so many of us have is that an event to celebrate a rich and diverse culture, under a literal and metaphorical broad tent, was covered with such bias so the reader walks away with no more understanding of Jewish heritage and culture than they had already.”

The rabbi of Chabad on the Vineyard, Tzvi Alperowitz, wrote in an email to his community that he was disappointed by the coverage. “The Jewish Culture Festival was a tremendous and remarkable community celebration. Close to one thousand people gathered in absolute harmony and unity to proudly celebrate Jewish culture and identity,” Alperowitz wrote. “But instead of a beautiful story about Jewish resilience and celebration in spite of the most tragic year for Jews since the Holocaust, the MV Times cynically chose to paint their coverage of the event through the lens of the few protesters who stood outside.”

Alperowitz continued: “That’s a choice that reflects poorly on the MV Times and its editorial team. Every rational individual can see straight through the piece and understands that it was a cynical use of clickbait to turn a proudly Jewish event into an opinion article bashing Israel.”

Who is in charge at the Martha’s Vineyard Times? The paper was purchased in January of this year by Stephen Bernier, who installed as publisher Charles Sennott. Sennott is a former Middle East bureau chief of the Boston Globe, where he was notorious for the anti-Israel tilt of his coverage. The watchdog organization Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting and Analysis (CAMERA) called Sennott “a virtual spokesman for the Palestinian side,” warning that “under Charles Sennott, the Boston Globe is in danger of reviving its former tradition of blaming Israel first, no matter what the facts.”

Since leaving the Globe, Sennott has been pursuing nonprofit journalism ventures, the latest of which is The GroundTruth Project, where he is listed as the founder and editor-in-chief. The GroundTruth website also lists former New York Times executive editor Dean Baquet as one of its directors, and the Ford Foundation as among its funders.

CAMERA has also been sharply critical of Sennott’s work with the GroundTruth Project. A CAMERA report on a three-part Sennott series attacking Christian Zionism called the work “outrageous” and said it featured “bigoted and sloppy reporting.”

“Sennott indoctrinates young journalists with his long-standing anti-Israel, anti-American, and anti-Evangelical biases,” Dexter Van Zile, then with CAMERA, wrote in a 2019 blog post for the Times of Israel. Van Zile then quoted David Parsons, vice president and senior international spokesperson for the International Christian Embassy in Jerusalem. “There are only two journalists I will never work with again and one of them is Charles Sennott,” Parsons said.

In a Dec. 15, 2023, LinkedIn posting, just weeks before assuming the Martha’s Vineyard Times role, Sennott faulted Israel for deliberately and “with impunity” killing scores of Palestinian and Lebanese journalists. Israel has disclosed evidence that some of the “journalists” were members of Gaza-based terrorist organizations. Sennott’s article, while faulting Israel, also omitted that Hamas restricts the activities of journalists in Gaza, with threats of violence.

I wrote to Sennott asking him whether he is trying to turn the weekly island newspaper into a vehicle for pushing an anti-Israel agenda, or whether there is a conflict in his dual roles at the Martha’s Vineyard Times and at the Ground Truth Project.

So far, I haven’t gotten a reply from him.

Ira Stoll was managing editor of The Forward and North American editor of The Jerusalem Post. His media critique, a regular Algemeiner feature, can be found here.

The post Anti-Israel Media Bias Flares in Martha’s Vineyard Paper Newly Led by Charles Sennott first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

Jews can pray where they choose in London, New York, Buenos Aires, or Sydney — but not in Jerusalem. The world is in an uproar after Israel’s National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir visited the Temple Mount to mark the solemn Jewish fast day of Tisha B’Av. Critics say that Ben Gvir disrupted the carefully-crafted status quo in Jerusalem — and even broke with the policy of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Ben Gvir says that he has the authority to assert his own guidelines.

The Temple Mount, which was the site of the first and second temples, should be a place where every Jew is permitted to visit without controversy. It seems that the only reason Jews are not allowed to pray there is the threat of a violent reaction from non-Jews, but how can this be allowed in a Jewish state? Surely some accommodation can be reached if both sides would be open to it. But sadly that’s not the case.

How can we have a Jewish state where Jews cannot visit one of the holiest places in their history because of threats of violence from others? If the answer is that this situation is just temporary, we need to seriously look at if that’s true — and ask how there can be a credible partner for peace when Jews are not allowed to visit this site due to threats of violence.

Jews can pray at Jewish holy sites anywhere in the world — just not in Jerusalem.

Critics took issue with Ben Gvir because they believe his move will disrupt ceasefire negotiations with Hamas.

US State Department Deputy spokesperson Vedant Patel said, “we certainly are paying close attention to actions and activities that we find to be a detraction from Israel’s security, a contributor to greater insecurity and instability in the region, and that would certainly be the actions that we saw today that Mr. Ben-Gvir participated in. Even the prime minister’s office itself made clear that the events of this morning are a deviation from what is Israeli policy and a deviation from the status quo.”

He went on: “any unilateral action like this that jeopardizes such status quo is unacceptable. And not only is it unacceptable, it detracts from what we think is a vital time as we are working to get this ceasefire deal across the finish line. It detracts from what our stated goal is for the region, which is a two-state solution, a Palestinian state and an Israeli state that’s side-by-side, living in — with dignity and harmony.”

If this two-state solution that will see people live “with dignity and harmony” is shaken up by a few Jews praying, then what is the plan for changing that in the future? The reality today is that Jews are only allowed to ascend the Temple Mount during very limited hours, and it is closed to Jews on Shabbat. Yet Arabs can mostly pray freely.

One also wonders why international critics bother so often and so much with the tiny Jewish State, instead of paying attention to crises close to their own homes, such as violent and deadly protests — or actual human rights violations occurring throughout the globe.

In the long term, if Jews wanting to pray peacefully causes an uproar, then we don’t have a true partner for peace. Ben Gvir’s actions may have inflamed the situation — but the larger issue is one that needs to be addressed.

Ronn Torossian is an entrepreneur and philanthropist.

The post Ben Gvir’s Temple Mount Visit Raises a Larger Question first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN), one of the most strident anti-Israel lawmakers in the US Congress, defeated Don Samuels on Tuesday night in the Democratic primary for Minnesota’s 5th Congressional District.

Omar notched a decisive victory over Samuels, winning the race by roughly 13 percentage points. She received 56.2 percent of the vote compared to Samuels’ 42.9 percent.

“I am incredibly honored by this victory tonight,” Omar said to her supporters at a Minneapolis restaurant on Tuesday night. “I am honored to represent the people who welcomed me and my family as refugees to this incredible state.”

The congresswoman expanded on the margins of her 2022 reelection bid, in which she defeated Samuels by a narrow 2.1 percentage points.

Omar will represent the Democratic Party in the general election, where she will face off against Republican nominee Dalia Al-Aqidi — a pro-Israel, Iraq-born journalist, in November. Minnesota’s 5th Congressional District, which comprises Minneapolis and local suburbs, has consistently supported Democrats in the past, and Omar is expected to easily defeat her opponent.

Omar’s victory breaks a losing streak this election cycle for members of the so-called “Squad” — a cohort of progressive, anti-Israel members of the US House of Representatives. Reps. Jamaal Bowman (D-NY) and Rep. Cori Bush (D-MO) both lost their Democratic primary races to pro-Israel opponents in June and July, respectively.

Notably, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) did not heavily invest financial resources in Tuesday’s election. AIPAC, a major pro-Israel lobbying group, helped oust both Bowman and Bush by financially supporting their opponents. The group spent a staggering $14.5 million and $9 million to defeat Bowman and Bush, respectively.

In the months following Hamas’ slaughter of roughly 1,200 people throughout southern Israel on Oct. 7, the left-wing lawmakers have adopted a more adversarial posture toward the Jewish state. The Democratic electorate has simultaneously grown increasingly less supportive of Israel, according to recent polling.

Both advocates and critics of the Jewish state watched Omar’s race closely, considering it a potential indicator of whether anti-Israel views are still an electoral liability within the Democratic Party.

Since being elected to Congress in 2018, Omar has emerged as a harsh critic of Israel. She has accused the Jewish state of committing “ethnic cleansing” in Gaza and erecting an “apartheid” government in the West Bank. The lawmaker has also publicly declared support for the boycott, divestment, and sanctions movement (BDS), an initiative which seeks to turn the Jewish state into an international pariah as a first step to its eventual destruction.

Omar was among the first members of Congress to call for a ceasefire between Israel and the Hamas terrorist group in Gaza, arguing that the Jewish state’s military operations “indiscriminately” killed Palestinian civilians.

The post US Rep. Ilhan Omar Cruises to Victory in Primary Race, Ending Anti-Israel ‘Squad’ Losing Streak first appeared on Algemeiner.com.