In an Aug. 1 article, “Israel Says It Killed Several Hezbollah Members on Key Lebanon Hilltop,” by Pranav Baskar, The New York Times reported that 4,300 people had been killed in Lebanon during the hostilities between Hezbollah and Israel since the U.S./Israel – Iran war began on Feb. 28, 2026. The paper did not attribute the statistic to an entity, leading readers to believe that this was a proven fact rather than an alleged claim.
Notably, The Times did not have this issue when it reported on Israeli casualties. In the following sentence, The Times reported the claim by “Israeli officials [that] at least four Israeli civilians and more than 30 soldiers have been killed.”
It is unclear why the paper met its own standards with regard to source attribution for Israeli casualties, but not Lebanese casualties.
CAMERA contacted The Times to seek a correction, and to the paper’s credit, it amended the coverage to attribute the statistic to the Lebanese Health Ministry. The paper declined the second part of CAMERA’s request, however, to inform readers that the Lebanese Health Ministry is overseen by a member of a U.S.-recognized terrorist organization, Hezbollah member Rakan Nasreddine.
