UPDATE
Following the publication of this critique, Foreign Policy has amended the photo caption, removing the word “resistance.” It now reads: “Supporters of the Palestinian group Hamas hold a rally in Gaza City on March 24.” While it doesn’t include an appropriate adjective to describe Hamas, it is, nonetheless, a significant improvement.
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Hamas is a terrorist organization. Unfortunately, many media outlets have a hard time using this accurate terminology, preferring language such as “militant” or “extremist” to describe Hamas.
Foreign Policy magazine, however, has lowered the bar even further by reproducing a Getty Images photo with the caption:
Supporters of the Palestinian resistance group Hamas hold a rally in Gaza City on March 24.
We located the original photo on the Getty Images website where the caption reads:
Members of Hamas carry symbolic coffins during the support to uprising [sic] in Jerusalem and West Bank event, in Gaza City, Gaza on March 24, 2016.
This would appear to indicate that it was Foreign Policy itself that came up with the “resistance group” description.
Is indiscriminately launching thousands of rockets into Israel “resistance?” Is targeting Israeli civilians for murder “resistance?” Is abusing your own people by using them as human shields “resistance?”
No. It’s terrorism and it’s time that Foreign Policy stopped sanitizing Hamas.
To call Hamas a “resistance group” is to legitimize terrorism.
You can read more about misleading terminology, including how the media inaccurately labels terrorism, in HonestReporting’s “Red Lines: The 8 Categories of Media Bias.”
Please send your complaints to Foreign Policy – [email protected] – asking for the caption to be amended and remembering to include the hyperlink to the photo in question.
