AP’s Sympathetic Coverage of Hezbollah Pager Targets

The AP is one of the largest news agencies in the world, distributing stories to thousands of newspapers and broadcasters worldwide. Tens of millions of people read the stories provided by AP. It has long been criticized for its slanted coverage of Israel and the Palestinians, constantly presenting the former in a bad light and reporting sympathetically on the latter. Its latest report on Mossad’s Pagers caper, in which pagers used by Hezbollah had been rigged to explode when their owners picked them up to answer their alerts, carries on that tradition. More on how the AP has just reported on the current state of those injured by the “exploding pagers” can be found here: “Israel slams AP for sympathetic highlight of Hezbollah terrorists wounded in Mossad beeper op,” by Jacob Laznik, Jerusalem Post, August 7, 2025:

An Associated Press (AP) report published on Wednesday has drawn significant criticism, including from Israel’s Government Press Office (GPO), for its portrayal of Hezbollah terrorists as uninvolved survivors of Israel’s exploding pagers operation last September.

The report, which took testimony from victims of the covert Israeli operation, described Hezbollah as a “militant group” or “a major Shi’ite political party with a wide network of social institutions” instead of acknowledging its status as a terrorist organization, as designated by the United States and other countries. In fact, the report does not mention the word “terror.”

AP’s report centered on the aftermath of the covert Israeli operation in which more than 3,000 people were wounded and at least 12 were killed.

The operation involved two waves of simultaneous detonations targeting Hezbollah’s pagers and other electronic devices across Lebanon and Syria. It was aimed at incapacitating a large number of Hezbollah’s combat-ready ground forces and causing massive panic and disruption among its ranks.

A majority of the casualties were Hezbollah fighters, Hezbollah admitted, according to the report.

The report, which highlighted the plight of bystanders who were caught in the crossfire of the operation, said all the victims who were interviewed are either Hezbollah terrorists or personnel, or their direct relatives.

Among the individuals featured in the report was Mahdi Sheri, 23, a Hezbollah terrorist who was severely wounded during the attack. He had been ordered back to the front lines on the day of the attack. Before returning to battle, however, he spent some time with his family and charged his pager, which was not allowed to be used inside the house for security reasons.

When Sheri’s pager vibrated, he went to check it, and it exploded, AP reported. The blast resulted in the loss of his left eye, and he now has very limited vision in his right eye.

Sheri’s account highlighted the physical and emotional toll of his wounds. He can no longer play soccer and is undergoing rehabilitation.

Hezbollah is assisting him in finding a new job, as his ability to fight is now severely limited, Sheri said. He cannot return to a role alongside other Hezbollah fighters due to his physical limitations, he said….

Oh dear. He can “no longer play soccer.” And there are a few other things the half-blind Mahdi Sheri can no longer do: he can’t launch rockets into villages in the Galilee, and he can’t use tunnels to enter northern Israel to kill civilians. He’s now been put out of commission as a terrorist. Why does the AP present him in such a sympathetic light? And why does it also present Hezbollah not as a terror group, but as a caring employer, trying to find alternative employment for the partially blind Mahdi Sheri?

Sheri is a member of Hezbollah, a terrorist who was determined to murder Israeli civilians, possibly with blood on his hands already. He was blinded in one eye as a result of his pager exploding. Does he deserve our sympathy?

Let’s remember that those “fathers” of the handful of children who picked up the pagers and were themselves wounded, are terrorists, members of Hezbollah. They are legitimate targets; if a few children were injured by the pagers, that is only because their fathers let them pick up the vibrating pagers. The Mossad cannot be responsible for harm done if the owners of the pagers allowed their children to answer them.

The AP with malice aforethought continues to describe Hezbollah as consisting of “militants” rather than “terrorists,” even though the U.S. and dozens of other countries have formally designated Hezbollah as a “terrorist organization.” Its report said nothing about Hezbollah’s attack, launched on October 8, 2023 in support of Hamas, and the atrocities committed the day before.

Instead of carrying sob stories about “victims” of the Israeli pagers such as Mahdi Sheri, the AP should be carrying stories about those Israelis who have been murdered by Hezbollah terrorists. It should clearly label Hezbollah members not as “militants,” as it has been doing but rather, forthrightly as “terrorists.” It should explain that any harm done to innocents by the pagers — such as children of Hezbollah members who picked up the pagers when they vibrated — was obviously unintended by Mossad.

No more sympathy for the devil, please, AP. Pull up your socks, and tell the truth.