Is it déjà vu? An NPR report about Fakhri Abu Diab of Silwan, a Jerusalem neighborhood, “Activists say Israel tries to expel a whole Palestinian neighborhood in East Jerusalem” (Eleanor Beardsley and Nuha Musleh, May 19, 2026), is a story the audience has heard before.
Over 16 years ago, CAMERA critiqued an NPR segment from Nov. 26, 2009, describing the eviction of Palestinian families from the Silwan neighborhood in Jerusalem, including Abu Diab. In his analysis, Steven Stotsky described NPR’s framework for these specific types of stories. The outline applies exactly to today’s NPR reporting:
In a familiar scenario, a Palestinian spokesman’s allegations are amplified by a human rights organization and an oft-quoted Israeli activist. Token balance is supplied by including a brief statement by an Israeli official that fails to address the specific charges leveled. Genuine balance could be provided by Israeli experts who have studied the problem, but they are not called upon. The story promotes the charge that Israel uses discriminatory practices to uproot Arabs from their neighborhoods in east Jerusalem in order to establish a stronger Jewish presence.
Both the 2009 story and this week’s story about the same man and the same town each include one human rights organization, one Israeli activist, a brief statement by an Israeli official, the word “discriminatory,” and allegations of an attempt to “Judaize” the area.
Then and now, a human rights organization amplified these claims: in 2009, NPR used notoriously anti-Israel Human Rights Watch; in 2026, not-really-human-rights-but-labeled-that-way B’Tselem, which by all appearances, dedicates itself to demonizing Israel. True to form, a B’Tselem official said “the ‘Judaization’ of Silwan [was] being done with a ‘very dubious, discriminatory and rigged legal system.'”
Then and now, NPR quoted Israeli “activists” who are – no surprise – activists against Israeli policies and relentless advocates for Palestinian positions. In 2009, it was Daniel Seidemann, who worked to prevent Jewish home ownership and residency in east Jerusalem. In 2026, it is Angela Godfrey-Goldstein, an alumna of the Free Gaza Movement flotilla and currently co-director of Jahalin Solidarity, an organization whose stated purpose is to prevent “forcible displacement” of Palestinians.
Beardsley and Musleh also recast, as Stotsky outlined, the dispute over the demolition of illegally built homes into an accusation of Israeli discrimination.
The claim from 2009 that Israel’s “discriminatory practices” uprooted Arabs from their neighborhoods has not been borne out. In fact, the Arab population of Jerusalem has increased to 40 percent (in 2009, Arabs made up approximately 35 percent of Jerusalem’s population). Instead of reporting these facts, NPR uncritically quoted activists – the unreliable B’Tselem and “U.N. human rights experts” (who include terror apologist and rape denier Francesca Albanese, rape denier Reem Alsalem, and Michael Fakhri, who has a record of vilifying Israel) as saying Israeli actions to force increasing numbers of Palestinians out of east Jerusalem are ethnic cleansing. This is propaganda, not journalism.
Like in 2009, token balance is supplied in the form of a brief statement from an Israeli official that fails to meet the specific charges leveled. To emphasize the imbalance in 2009, Stotsky explored the lopsidedness of the piece vis-à-vis the word count: Diab, Seidemann and Human Rights Watch were given 277 words (in addition to much of NPR’s narrative); the Israeli representative was given 59 words.
In 2026, Diab, Godfrey-Goldstein, B’Tselem, and background supporting their claims were given 939 words, while the Israeli representative was given 87 words. This did not include 175 words for an archaeologist with the controversial organization Peace Now, who told NPR that settlers were manipulating archaeology to claim the land was biblically promised to the Jews.
In an apparent effort to balance Peace Now, NPR gave a random Jewish woman 56 words to talk about how the archaeology is important to counter those who undermine the historical connection of the Jewish people to the land of Israel, and Jerusalem in particular.
In the 87-word Israeli response, Jerusalem deputy mayor Arieh King rejected the claim of ethnic cleansing and called it antisemitic hypocrisy.
One thing that has changed since 2009 is that Diab’s home was demolished two years ago, amidst international condemnation, after Israeli authorities said he lacked the right building permits. Beardsley and Musleh quoted residents and human rights groups (linking to Human Rights Watch) to support the false claim that it was difficult or impossible for Palestinians to obtain building permits. Actually, the process to obtain a permit for Jews and Palestinians is identical.
Despite the provocative headline of Israel threatening to “expel a whole neighborhood,” Beardsley and Musleh reported that 48 homes have been demolished since 2023, and of the 20,000 Palestinians in the neighborhood, less than 15 percent allegedly face expulsion according to B’Tselem. Without diminishing how it feels to lose a home under any circumstances, this is certainly not expelling “a whole neighborhood,” nor is it ethnic cleansing. Notably, NPR did not seek comment from Israeli authorities as to whether those numbers were accurate, or what the specific reasons were for those facing expulsion.
It will be interesting to see what story from Silwan NPR publishes in 2042, and whether it follows the same formula. For now, NPR continues to line up its favored anti-Israel activists and organizations to ensure they serve the network’s narrative of morphing a zoning dispute into a war crime.