Numerous Agence France Presse captions about 17-year-old Palestinian Muhammad Zakarneh, fatally wounded by Israeli fire, omit the key information that according to the Israeli army, the teen had fired upon Israeli soldiers.
AFP provides a false symmetry, concealing the glaring asymmetry which defines this latest round of violence, and each round before this one: the Israeli casualties were all terror victims. Virtually all of Palestinian casualties were perpetrators, carrying out violent attacks.
In a striking double standard, AFP finds private Israeli citizens calling for "Death to Arab" newsworthy, but not official and repeated government Hamas praise for "the heroic Beersheba operation."
History shows it doesn't take much for Gaza sources to override the essential journalistic dose of skepticism. After gargantuan flour consumption and Israeli-induced flooding, the latest tall tale hits the MRI machine-bereft territory: soaring mountains of spent batteries as high as the Arc de Triomphe.
AFP points an accusing finger at Israel for not handing over disputed antiquities to the Palestinian Authority while completely ignoring the relevant Oslo Accords.
AFP falsely reports that Israeli Ambassador to the United Nations Gilad Erdan failed to respond to the Palestinian representative's vilification of Israel as an "apartheid" state. In fact, Erdan directly refuted Riyad Mansour's assault.
Don't be fooled by AFP's qualified reference to unsubstantiated Israeli claims of unspecified "terror." This week's captions cover up for Yehuda Dimantmen's suspected murderer just as much as 2019 AFP captions covered up for the murderer of Rabbi Eitam and Naama Henkin.
AFP's headline ignores that the three slain Palestinians were card-carrying members of a designated terror organization, and its many captions cast information about their terror activity as an Israeli claim though the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade has openly claimed them.
Haaretz is the second media outlet to correct in recent days after publishing the unfounded claim that elderly Palestinian-American Omar As'ad died while in Israeli military custody. In fact, the timing of his death is unclear, with no evidence that he died while in IDF custody.
Eviction of Palestinian residents of Sheikh Jarrah who failed to prove ownership or show payment of rent as protected tenants are the center of massive international attention. Despite the sober responsibility to adhere to high standards of professionalism, journalistic performance is at times as spotty as residents' ownership bids.
