For the third time since May’s 11-day war between Israel and Hamas, The New York Times has released a video implicitly critical of Israel’s conduct and that almost totally excises the US-designated Palestinian terrorist group from the story.
The video, titled The Toll of War in Gaza: Times Video Shows Survivors’ Trauma, was published on August 10 and accompanied by an article by Sarah Bahr explaining that the Times had dispatched a team to Gaza on a months-long project described as “a rare opportunity to examine the toll that perpetual warfare and rebuilding has on residents there.”
The article was published on the second page of the paper’s print edition on Tuesday.
The latest video was similar to one released by the Times a month ago, and complemented a separate visual “investigation” that insinuated that the IDF caused the collapse of apartment buildings in the Gaza Strip during the conflict by irresponsibly deploying bombs against Hamas targets in the heart of an urban center — a theory that HonestReporting debunked.
The NYT also produced another considerably shorter video about the experiences of Israelis during the conflict.
Lies, Damned Lies, And Statistics
Much of the content of this latest video was comprised of footage from the previous one — ‘So They Know We Existed’: Palestinians Film War in Gaza — which was released July 14.
Common to both is a text that flashes on-screen towards the end:
Over the 11 days of fighting, the U.N. said 260 Palestinians were killed in Gaza and 13 people were killed in Israel.”
But the numbers, which were also included in Bahr’s article, do not tell the whole story.
Indeed, left out by the Times is the fact that, according to the UN, 132 of those killed in Gaza were terrorists. And the true number may be significantly higher. Meanwhile, among those killed in Israel by Hamas and Islamic Jihad rocket fire was only one was a soldier.
This information is highly significant because it shows that Hamas was intentionally targeting civilians, in contravention of international law.
By providing readers with raw, decontextualized fatality figures, the Times is painting an incomplete, if not deceptive, picture.
Unmentioned: Hamas Policy of Human Shields
Moreover, not once in the most recent video are viewers informed of Hamas’ policy of hiding behind human shields. The Palestinian terrorist organization deliberately builds military headquarters, command centers, tunnels, rockets and other assets in the heart of densely populated urban centers in Gaza.
As a result, innocent people are purposely placed in harm’s way.
The flip side of Hamas’ tactic — which constitutes a double war crime — is its publicly stated goal of striking Israeli cities and towns in order to kill as many civilians as possible. In fact, the war in May commenced when, unprovoked, Hamas launched an RPG at an Israeli on a hilltop adjacent to Gaza, which was quickly followed by the firing of a volley of rockets at Jerusalem.
The Times’ omission of these seemingly inconvenient facts is inexcusable.
Baby “Sword of Jerusalem” Named After Hamas’ Rocket-Firing Campaign
Another clip that is recycled by the Times shows a young couple holding their newborn baby. The proud mother, Areej Abu Aoda, tells the interviewers that she named her son Seif al-Quds.
Somewhat incredibly, the Times failed to translate the name.
Seif al-Quds, literally “Sword of Jerusalem,” would be bad enough if it wasn’t also the name Hamas gave to May’s terrorist campaign against Israel.
If the Times had bothered to inform readers, they would have been able to fully understand the sheer irony of the subsequent line in the video: “And the next day, his birth blessed us with a cease-fire,” the baby’s father Ahmad Abu Aoda said with a straight face.
But viewers missed all of this because the Times failed to provide basic context.
Smiling Girls and Rescue Workers, But No Combatants
A pair of teenage Gazan sisters, Tasneem and Sma Ahel, 17 and 15 years old, respectively, from the previous video are featured, with extra footage included this time. In addition, a ten-year-old girl, Amal Naseer, also appears. Like the Ahel sisters, Naseer recounts how a building she was in was hit and that she was showered with debris.
Also included is Alaa al-Nuaizi, a rescue worker who tells of the difficulties of searching for people caught under collapsed buildings. “I think about all these people I couldn’t save,” he said.
That children and rescue workers should be featured is understandable. The problem is the Times distorts reality by neglecting to mention Hamas’ role in their hardship.
Additionally, the Times focuses exclusively on Israeli airstrikes but at no point even mentions the hundreds of Hamas and Islamic Jihad rockets that fell short of Israel, contributing to the death and destruction in Gaza.
Unfortunately, civilians suffer in wartime. Telling their stories is important. But if their stories are heard while the camera is kept firmly focused away from the root cause of the conflict — namely, Gaza-based terrorist groups — the resulting account is distorted beyond recognition.
The End Result: Hamas Propaganda?
One of the most important issues about reporting from Gaza that the public is largely unaware of is that Hamas necessarily shapes the narrative.
In this respect, four words in Bahr’s article may not have attracted much attention but are of immense significance. She noted that Yousur Al-Hlou, a video journalist, and Neil Collier, a former NYT staff member who now works as a freelancer, traveled to Gaza to produce The Toll of War in Gaza: Times Video Shows Survivors’ Trauma only after “securing permission from Hamas.”
Journalists in Gaza know that they can only film what Hamas allows them to. Reporters in Gaza are aware that they cannot openly mention Hamas’ practice of using human shields or probe the urban locations where terror assets have been placed. While in Gaza, foreign journalists, in particular, are almost always accompanied by Hamas escorts who vet their every move.
Those who don’t toe the line are liable to be harassed, have footage destroyed or risk being banned from the enclave.
The all-too-often end result: Propaganda.
