HonestReporting’s efforts to ensure that international media outlets report on issues pertaining to Israel fairly and accurately continue to be more critical than ever. And we are proud to share that over the past two months our work again produced a significant impact, including exposing biased journalists, prompting major news organizations to correct numerous falsities and getting shared far and wide.
Between August 29, the release date of our previous impact report, and November 8, we published 40 in-depth news critiques, 15 educational articles and 14 videos. Furthermore, our work was cited some 100 times by widely-read English-language media outlets.
Concurrently, HonestReporting is constantly reaching new audiences through social media, being mentioned some 11,000 times during the above-mentioned period by Twitter users alone.
Jewish groups demand resignation of Twitter Middle East news director after anti-Israel tweets resurfacehttps://t.co/ml1Ad79uh8
— Fox News (@FoxNews) November 8, 2021
Just last week, we induced an apology from Fadah Jassem, Twitter’s new Editorial Curation Lead for the Middle East and North Africa (MENA).
Jassem, who worked as a journalist for Al-Jazeera, in a tweet announcing her hiring had included the flags of 16 countries in the MENA region, as well as the Palestinian banner.
Conspicuously absent, however, was the Israeli flag.
Jassem’s unsavory social media history quickly came to light, perhaps foremost that she had disseminated a tweet declaring that Israel was “not born” but, rather, “dropped like a bomb in the middle of Palestine.”
In 2010, she seemingly cited notorious Jew-hater and Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan as saying that, “we give you our tax dollar to support Israel every year.”
After HonestReporting reached out to Jassem, she expressed regret: “I can see that I have been ill-informed with some tweets when [I was] younger. I apologise for any offence caused by these particular tweets.” [NOTE: British spelling]
Thank you for the reply. Glad to hear it. Really. A number of my colleagues remain concerned, citing pro-Israel accounts being blocked and a comment with the Israeli flag being hidden.
Looking forward to productive, mutually respectful interactions going forward.
— (((Emanuel Miller))) (@emanumiller) November 1, 2021
Fox News on November 8 was among numerous media outlets that cited HonestReporting in coverage of the story and its developments. Others included The Times of Israel, Algemeiner, The Forward and the South Florida Sun Sentinel.
Meanwhile, our ongoing investigation into the property dispute in the eastern Jerusalem neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah/Shimon HaTzadik has received widespread media attention (see, for example, here, here and here).
We were among the first organizations to issue a statement criticizing the outrageous inclusion of notorious anti-Israel activists and Sheikh Jarrah residents Muna and Mohammed El-Kurd in TIME Magazine’s annual list of the 100 most influential people in the world.
We highlighted how Mohammed El-Kurd, in particular, has a long history of spreading baseless anti-Israel smears and antisemitic tropes.
#Palestinian activist siblings Mohammed El-Kurd and Muna El-Kurd were included in the prestigious Time Magazine list of the 100 most influential people of 2021, which was published on September 15, reviving heavy criticism of the twins.https://t.co/0GwefaFVKj
— The Jerusalem Post (@Jerusalem_Post) September 19, 2021
Last week, we showed how the Palestinian Authority and Hamas played an instrumental role in quashing a proposal by Israel’s Supreme Court that would have ended the Sheikh Jarrah/Shimon HaTzadik ordeal, which media have almost uniformly misrepresented and, in the process, transformed into an anti-Israel cause celebre.
In October, we were reminded of the tangible political influence HonestReporting is having when a member of the UK House of Lords, Baroness Ruth Deech, tweeted a link to one of our articles about a New York Times guest essayist, Refaat Alareeer, who had compared Israel to Nazi Germany more than 100 times over two years.
.@nytimes New York Times Guest Essayist Refaat Alareer Compared Israel to Nazi Germany Over 100 Times https://t.co/ioPDI4Uds4 via @honestreporting NYTimes has had this problem for years
— Ruth Deech (@BaronessDeech) October 10, 2021
Our tireless work exposing anti-Israel journalists employed by, or who are regular contributors to, some of the world’s leading news organizations is gaining steam.
Earlier this year, we outed BBC journalist Tala Halawa for having expressed support for Adolf Hitler. She was thereafter summarily let go.
And this week we helped reveal that another journalist at the BBC made a number of antisemitic remarks.
Not again. Another antisemite at the @BBC.
Nasima Begum is an arts council-supported charity advocate and trustee who has also worked occasionally as a presenter for @BBCRadioManc.
She is also a rabid and vocal antisemite, with a LONG history of hate-filled social media posts. pic.twitter.com/7MieoDP9i8
— HonestReporting (@HonestReporting) November 7, 2021
Nasima Begum is an arts council-supported charity advocate and trustee who has worked as a presenter for BBC Radio Manchester.
She has called for “death to you Zionist scum” and tweeted that “Zionists” have a “hold on mainstream media.” She also ranted that Israel is guilty of “killing innocent people and terrori[z]ing them daily.”
At the same time, we have continued to draw attention to inaccuracies in the media, like when NBC News headlined a story about a Palestinian who was shot dead by Israeli security forces while perpetrating a terrorist attack.
The major US outlet had deceptively titled the piece, “Israeli police shoot to death Palestinian woman in Jerusalem’s Old City,” but following HonestReporting’s intervention the headline was altered to: “Palestinian woman shot dead after attempted stabbing, police in Israel say.”
After attempting to STAB them.
But readers scanning headlines at the @NBCNews website wouldn’t know that. pic.twitter.com/5ZiPJPmhNP
— HonestReporting (@HonestReporting) September 30, 2021
As we continue to expand and enhance our activities, we ask you to support our work by regularly visiting our website and signing up to receive our free IsraBites newsletter.
We also encourage you to send us an email if you spot anti-Israel bias in the media, and to share our articles through your social media channels and among family and friends.
Lastly, you can help fund our work by making a donation.
Together, we will continue to hold the media to account.
