The paper of record has a reputation of failing to define critical words when it comes to the dangerous anti-Israel and anti-Jewish beliefs of bigots. Recently, on July 14, The New York Times’ Johan Bromwich politely referred to Mahmoud Khalil as “pro-Palestine” in his article “Mahmoud Khalil Accuses Trump Officials of Conspiring Against Him.” Labeling him this way ensures readers do not understand what Khalil represents.
The paper’s stripping of language is not a new tactic. As CAMERA has explained before, phrases like “pro-Palestinian advocacy” have become devoid of meaning. Khalil is a terror-supporter who wants to see Israel destroyed, and The Times should say so.
Bromwich described Khalil as “the Columbia University protestor who became the face of President Trump’s campus crackdown.” But just days after Oct. 7, 2023, when Israel was still counting its dead and its kidnapped from the Hamas-led attack and massacre, Khalil became the face leading the overtly racist chant, “From water to water, Palestine will be Arab,” and the better-known English version “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free.”
As lead negotiator for Columbia University Apartheid Divest, Khalil reportedly distributed Hamas propaganda at one of their events. At another, he aligned with Hamas in support of having tried “armed resistance.” He previously told The Times that “globalize the intifada” was not a call for violence and that the Second Intifada – a five-year period of Palestinian terror killing over 1,100 Israelis and injuring over 8,300 – was “overwhelmingly . . . peaceful.” In an interview with The Forward, Khalil made clear his total opposition to Jews having an independent state. Khalil advocates for a “one-state solution,” replacing the State of Israel with the State of Palestine.
In the article, Bromwich used vague language to gloss over Khalil’s support for terror and eliminationist convictions, indirectly labeling his conduct as criticism of Israel. We know this because Khalil’s argument, Bromwich summarized, is that “criticism of Israel is not inherently antisemitic.”
Rather than clearly define it, the paper continues its spectacular record of using the term “pro-Palestine” frequently and vaguely. Certainly, some define being “pro-Palestine” as “want[ing] Palestinians to be afforded basic humanity.” This may well be the prevalent belief, as Pew polling shows a higher level of support for the Palestinian people than for the Palestinian Authority and Hamas. And in a recent opinion piece about the Brooklyn co-op that voted to boycott Israeli products, the author used this sanitized (perhaps mainstream) belief when she wrote, “We are dividing our communities into two camps — pro-Israel versus pro-Palestine — when, I believe, the only hope for the over 14 million people who live in Israel and the occupied territories is a vision that is both pro-Palestinian and pro-Israeli.”
But when The Times refers to Khalil, Mamdani and the group Within Our Lifetime as “pro-Palestine,” they are ignoring support for terror and their active work towards, or desire for, the elimination of the Jewish state. Instead, the paper leads readers to believe that these people just want humanity for Palestinians.
The closest the paper came to admitting this was in a Bret Stephens’ opinion piece where he wrote:
[t]oo much of what passes for a pro-Palestinian movement but is really pro-Hamas, with its calls to get rid of the Jewish state in its entirety (“from the river to the sea …”), its open celebration of the murder of its people (“resistance is justified …”) and its efforts to mock, minimize or deny the suffering of Israelis, which so quickly descend[s] into [antisemitism] . . .
More often than not, The Times tap-dances around this, like in a July 23, 2025, article, when it quoted the co-founder of Muslims for Progress. Farhana Islam said that some “pro-Palestinian organizations” might be upset with Mamdani because he ultimately said he would discourage people from using the term “globalize the intifada,” though she understood he did so for votes. She then qualified the statement by saying, “But if I were to put on my pro-Palestine hat, it would not be aligned with an authentic view for a free Palestine.” The paper did not connect the dots for its readers though – that supporting “globalize the intifada” was consistent with Islam’s “pro-Palestine” position.
To the Times we can borrow a line from The Princess Bride: “You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.”
This is an ongoing problem for the paper. CAMERA wrote months ago about The Times’ machinations when it labeled New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani a “sharp critic of Israel.” The mayor is not a critic, sharp or otherwise, of the state’s government or its policies. Both Khalil and Mamdani seek the total elimination of the Jewish state.
The Times recently mislabeled Mamdani again. In so doing, the paper acknowledged its perpetuation of mythologizing him as solely an Israel critic and advocate for Palestinian rights, when in a July 19 interview, Katrin Bennhold’s question for him began with: “A lot of our readers known you as somebody who has criticized Israel and advocated for the rights of Palestinians.”
If the paper had done its job, “a lot of [its] readers” would have known him as someone who wants to destroy the Jewish state and have it replaced with a Palestinian one.
By flattening the distinction between peaceful advocacy for Palestinian civil rights and active support for Israel’s elimination, The Times does a profound disservice to its readership. By treating calls for the destruction of Israel as “criticism” and whitewashing terror-supporters as generic “pro-Palestinian” advocates, it stops reporting news and begins softening extremism.
If Khalil’s beliefs are today’s definition of “pro-Palestine,” The Times has a duty to let its readers know.