This Oct. 4, 2026, Op-Ed by CAMERA’s Shay Khatiri was published by Jerusalem News Syndicate.
The United Nations convened its 81st session of its General Assembly last month, with heads of government speaking between Sept. 22 and Sept. 26. As in recent years, many of the speeches and most of the media coverage focused on Israel and its alleged atrocities against Palestinians, and included efforts to delegitimize the Jewish state through staged mass walkouts. In contrast, journalists treated truly atrocious leaders, such as the Islamic Republic of Iran President Masoud Pezeshkian, as respectable peacemakers.
A BBC report covered Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s address delivered on Sept. 25, stating that “more than 73,920 people have been killed in Gaza, according to the territory’s Hamas-run health ministry,” omitting that roughly a third of them were militants.
It then added, “Last year, the world’s leading association of genocide scholars declared that Israel was committing genocide in Gaza.”
The report failed to mention that the only presumed qualification to join the organization—the International Association of Genocide Scholars—is paying a $125 membership fee and that it doesn’t require any scholarly work for members.
The New York Times likewise published a news item on the speech. On top of the article, it featured a video of the performative walkout. It, too, cited the United Nations and nonprofits accusing Israel of genocide, a term that has since 2023 replaced the word “war.”
Read the rest of CAMERA’s Op-Ed at JNS.