The tragic story of two young Israelis who died in a flooded elevator in a Tel Aviv apartment building made international news. Dean Yaakov Shoshani and Stav Harari, both 25, drowned after the elevator became stuck as water flooded into the building as a result of severe rainfall.
The International Business Times covered the story and included the following:
The Times of Israel reported that residents of the area blamed the police for neglect. The residents claim that the working-class south Tel Aviv area with a predominantly Arab population is being neglected by city officials, while the north and central areas get preferential treatment.
Plenty of media buy into the framework that Israel discriminates against its own Arab citizens. So is the IBT suggesting that the Hatikvah neighborhood where this horrific incident took place, is neglected because it is predominantly Arab?
A look at The Times of Israel report from where the IBT took this information tells a different story:
Residents of working class south Tel Aviv and adjacent Jaffa, home to several Arab-majority neighborhoods, have long complained of neglect from city officials and others compared to better-off neighborhoods in north and central Tel Aviv.
Actually, the Hatikvah neighborhood of south Tel Aviv is, as one tourist website describes it, a “genuine melting pot of cultures, ethnicities, and ages.” It is not an Arab-majority neighborhood, it is predominantly Jewish.
The deaths of two Israelis is one case where the Tel Aviv municipality is taking criticism for allegedly neglecting its residents. But making this about the religion or ethnicity of those residents was never part of the story and the IBT’s writer has misinterpreted the Times of Israel report to fit an existing bias.
HonestReporting has requested a correction from the IBT.
© Divuach Ne’eman R”A, 2025
