When it comes to its coverage of Israel and the Palestinians, the Washington Post’s anti-Israel animus has become so pronounced that it now rivals that of the Guardian. More on the latest example in the Post of how to be anti-Israel without directly lying can be found here: “The media knows the truth. They just choose to hide it from you.” Elder of Ziyon, August 25, 2024:
The Washington Post demonstrated yesterday how to be anti-Israel without directly lying.
The headline (since updated) says 10 Palestinians killed. The article says, twice, 10 Palestinians killed.
Three times, once in the headline and twice in the body of the article, the Post reports that “10 Palestinians killed.” The reader likely assumes that these are ordinary civilians, as there is initially no indication that they are terrorists.
Finally, in paragraph four, it mentions Islamic Jihad admitted six of its terrorists were killed and Hamas admitted three of its own terrorists were killed. That’s nine out of ten.
The headline implies that all the dead were civilians. At least nine of out ten were terrorists. Perhaps the tenth was also a terrorist, from the PFLP or Al Aqsa Brigades.
But how many people read that far?
Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad have recognized — they’re proud of their “martyrs” — that nine of the ten Palestinians killed were their members — six from PIJ, and three from Hamas. But before we learn that information in paragraph four, we have had mentioned in the headline — which is often the only part of a story to which people pay attention — that there were “10 Palestinians killed.” Not “ten terrorists killed.” Not “ten members of Hamas and PIJ killed.” Just “10 Palestinians killed.”
Even worse, when it mentions the six dead Islamic Jihad terrorists – which included two Islamic Jihad mujahid children, not mentioned – it adds that “it was not immediately clear whether those casualties were included in the count announced by authorities.” In other words, even though they just showed that most of the dead were terrorists, maybe they weren’t counted, so Israel really did kill ten civilians….
In the headline, and in the first sentence of the first paragraph, the Post reporters ought to have made unambiguously clear who had been killed by the IDF in its latest incursion into the West Bank. Of the ten people killed, Hamas has claimed three and PIJ nine. The tenth, we may find out, could have belonged to another of the terrorist groups, such as the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, known to operate in the West Bank. That’s why the headline should have read “nine Hamas and PIJ terrorists killed by IDF in West Bank.” And gone on, in the first paragraph — not waiting until the fourth paragraph to reveal their Hamas and PIJ connections — to explain that “of the ten people killed by the IDF in the West Bank on August 28, Hamas has claimed three, and Palestinian Islamic Jihad has claimed six. The possible terrorist connection of the tenth person is now being looked into.”
But the Post didn’t want to make things clear. It wanted to subtly suggest that all ten people killed were civilians, and only in its fourth paragraph, which many readers never get to, does it note that nine of the ten have been claimed by Hamas and PIJ. It’s not a question of lying, but of how the truth is released only after the headline — “ten Palestinians killed — and the first few paragraphs have fixed in the readers’ minds the notion that those killed were civilians. Come on, Washington Post. Let’s get beyond all this fiddle. Tell the truth and tell it straight.
Westman says
The WaPo is just in the top section of the iceberg. There are thousands of ice cubes below, many with influence like Judge Napolitano, Jeffrey Sachs, Scott Ritter, etc. One should hear the pejoratives and outlandish casualty statistics they claim. They would be content to see Israel dissappear.
Someone needs to paint an accurate cross-section of Jewish Israeli society instead of viewing it as black box with uniform contents. It is not a unified society nor does the burden of war and the economy lie equally upon the citizen group who most calls for it. I could be wrong, yet it appears from this drawn-out war that Israel cannot indefinitely continue its existence, in an increasingly hostile neighborhood, without all of its citizens engaged in its economy and defense.
somehistory says
One must search for Truth. Truth is worth the time it takes to look for it.
Another item in the news…
“Seized Hamas documents show terror group inflated its support rates, IDF says
Story by Emanuel Fabian, Gianluca Pacchiani
“The Israel Defense Forces released Hamas documents on Thursday that it said showed Hamas had secretly falsified its levels of public support in polls conducted by the Ramallah-based Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research (PCPSR).
The IDF said the documents do not prove that PCPSR was cooperating with Hamas, but rather that the terror group was conducting clandestine actions to fraudulently influence the results of the polls.”
PCPSR, which is based in the West Bank city of Ramallah, is run by prominent Palestinian pollster Khalil Shikaki.
In the Gaza Strip, the firm uses Gazan data collectors to conduct surveys in residential areas and shelters for displaced Palestinians, and it is thought that Hamas was able to take advantage of this to manipulate the results later sent back to Shikaki.
The alleged Hamas security apparatus documents (English translated version), which the military said were found in Gaza, showed the results of a PCPSR poll from March 2024, with both the alleged original data and the falsified numbers.
One document, under “corrected result” — the figure that was published — gave Hamas’s approval rating in Gaza as 62 percent, compared with what was termed the “actual result” of 31.9% support; Hamas Gaza chief Yahya Sinwar’s “corrected” approval rating as 52%, up from 22.1% “actual” support; and there was a 71% “corrected” approval rating for the October 7 onslaught, up from an “actual” 30.7%.
An alleged Hamas document released by the IDF on August 29, 2024, appears to show how the terror group falsified polls by PCPSR. (Israel Defense Forces)
An alleged Hamas document released by the IDF on August 29, 2024, appears to show how the terror group falsified polls by PCPSR. (Israel Defense Forces)
“The survey results have been revised according to the practices followed in previous surveys, and the results have been sent by the source to the center in Ramallah,” read the document.
“Note: The attached actual survey results are confidential and intended for limited distribution,” it added.
According to the IDF, the documents it recovered in Gaza “prove an extensive effort by the terror organization to falsify the results of [the PCPSR] polls, to create a false representation of the Gazan public’s support for the terror organization, especially after the massacre [in Israel] on October 7.
“These documents are part of a systematic process, the purpose of which is to disguise the collapse of the organization, and the collapse of public support for it,” the IDF claimed.
The military said the documents “emphasize the importance that the Hamas terror organization sees in the results of the polls, to falsify Palestinian support and to influence the Palestinian public and Arab and international public opinion.”
If they lie about this….and they are lying about it….they and their operatives in the various news orgs, will lie about anything and everything.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/seized-hamas-documents-show-terror-group-inflated-its-support-rates-idf-says/ar-AA1pH8eh?ocid=msedgntp&pc=HCTS&cvid=daeb403d9fb14dfeadcefeddcd90721b&ei=137
Rick Gordon says
The decline of America’s journalism must come in part to our higher education schools of journalism. Yes, I would expect such in Washington DC or NYC, and other far left hot spots but such biased reporting is still unsettling.
Such misinformation causes and supports the use of social media by those frustrated by it.
࿗Infidel࿘ says
Does Jeff Bezos still think that 💵 spent on WaPo in this economy is 💸 well spent?
Just wondering