Nicholas Kristof’s Calumniating Column

CAMERA has now published its first take on Nicholas Kristof’s error-prone piece on the supposed sexual violence of the IDF and Israeli prison guards. The New York Times published Kristof’s piece just one day before Israeli researchers published their 300-page study of Hamas’ use of sexual violence, in an attempt to undermine that report. The Times was offered the Israeli report, but declined to publish it, and days later, despite the outrage over Kristof’s accusations against Israel for “sexual violence,” the Times still will not publish the Israel report on Hamas’ sexual violence. More on the contents, and timing, of Kristof’s calumny can be found here: “CAMERA Statement: Grave Issues in Kristof’s Sexual Assault Column,” CAMERA, May 12, 2026:

Earlier today, Israeli researchers published a meticulously documented report detailing the use of sexual violence as a key component of Hamas’s Oct. 7 attacks and the subsequent captivity of hostages. The authors informed the New York Times of the report, and reportedly of its publication date, but the newspaper declined to pursue the story.

Instead, in an apparent (and successful) attempt to distract from the findings, the New York Times and its columnist Nicholas Kristof chose the evening before the report’s publication to publish an Opinion piece equating Israel to Hamas and charging “Israeli sexual violence” by prison guards.

Any credible allegations of abuse should be investigated. At the same time, Kristof’s column clearly fails to meet the standards of ethical journalism. The piece, for example, relies heavily on Euro-Med, an extremist NGO whose founder and chairman Ramy Abdu has repeatedly peddled disinformation about Israel — including falsehoods slurring the Jewish state as sexually deviant. In a 2023 social media post, Abdu shared a map of incoming rocket alert locations, falsely insisting it was “a map of registered sex offenders living in Israel.” The post remains up today, long after the lie was debunked.

Abdu has also misrepresented images from the Syrian civil war as being from the Gaza Strip, and elsewhere falsely claimed that civilian hostages held by Hamas were soldiers. Euro-Med’s chairman of the board Richard Falk, meanwhile, has warmly endorsed an anti-Jewish book by a notorious antisemite and Holocaust denier, and has been criticized by the United Nations Secretary General for promoting 9/11 conspiracy theories. Despite its disqualification as a credible source, Kristof cites Euro-Med three times in his column.

Kristof doesn’t share with readers that another of his sources, Sami al-Sai, had previously charged Palestinian officials with torturing him in a Palestinian prison, but had flatly contradicted his own account when speaking to the Palestinian Journalists Syndicate. Whichever of his versions was true, an ethical journalist would at least inform readers of his inconsistent history on the topic….

Kristof relies for his sources on proven liars, including Rami Abdu and Sami al-Sai, as well as on the organization Euro-Med, which Richard Falk, who for decades has been toiling in the anti-Israel vineyards, now heads. That is grounds enough to discredit Kristof’s report. Falk has endorsed a book by a notorious Holocaust denier and antisemite. He has been criticized by the UN Secretary General for spreading 9/11 conspiracy theories. Kristof appears not to know these things about Euro-Med’s head. Instead, he relies on Euro-Med for three of his claims. Nor did Kristof report accurately on Ehud Olmert’s testimony, which he used to support his charge of “rapes.” After seeing Kristof’s article, which attributes to Ehud Olmert a statement in support of the claim that the IDF engaged in rape, Olmert told the Free Press that Kristof had deliberately misinterpreted his remark: “I have no knowledge of these claims.”

Now the government of Israel has decided to sue the New York Times for defamation. It has plenty of evidence to back up its complaint. For example, there is Kristof’s false charge that the Israelis “train dogs to rape Palestinians,” for which there is not the slightest evidence, and which dog handlers have testified would be an impossibility. Kristof claims, too, that “the horrific abuse inflicted on Israeli women on Oct. 7 now happens to Palestinians day after day.” Either this is true, or it is false, and if false, it amounts to the most damaging kind of defamation of the people and state of Israel. I can’t wait to see the lawyers for Israel meticulously rebut Kristof for each of his false and foul charges, until he is left silent, with no further replies and lies possible. And then one hopes that both the New York Times and Nicholas Kristof will have to pay huge sums — billions in the case of the newspaper, tens of millions from Kristof — to the state of Israel. That will be a salutary lesson for those who routinely defame the Jewish state.