March 2 UPDATE, 2:25 pm ET:
AP Corrects
After CAMERA's communication with editors and publication of the post, AP corrected its article so to make clear that "Washington and Tel Aviv" was the language of the Russian Foreign Ministry. The correction appeared in more than three dozen secondary media outlets. See below for a detailed update.
March 2 — As the United States and Israel entered the second day of attacks against the imperialistic Islamic Republic of Iran, leading news agencies Associated Press and Agence France Presse lapsed into an old media vice: misidentifying Tel Aviv as Israel's capital.
President Trump signs the Knesset guestbook in Jerusalem, Israel's capital, October 2025 (Photo by Avi Ohayon/GPO)
Thus, using the journalistic shorthand of referring to a country by its capital, AP's Claudia Ciobanu, Sam McNeil and Sam Metz, wrote in their March 1 article, "World Leaders React Cautiously to US and Israel strikes, death of Iran [sic] Ali Khamenei":
The [Russian foreign] ministry accused Washington and Tel Aviv of “hiding behind” concerns about Iran’s nuclear program while actually pursuing regime change.
Rather ironically, the erroneous reference to Tel Aviv as a stand in for Israel appears under a subheading "Careful wording is (mostly) the order of the day." The error also appears in Spanish.
Oh, the irony. Under subheadline "Careful wording is (mostly) the order of the day," @AP refers to "Washington and Tel Aviv." Boker tov, Eliyahu. Jerusalem is Israel's capital. @APFactCheck https://t.co/kYnyijw6Rt (1/2) pic.twitter.com/DNwmkl2BW8
— Tamar Sternthal (@TamarSternthal) March 2, 2026
Displaying a gross lack of intel on the subject, Agence France Presse joined in with full firepower on the attack against Jerusalem's status as Israel's capital. Its March 1 article, "CIA intel guided strikes that killed Iran supreme leader: NYT," erred:
Washington and Tel Aviv originally planned to launch strikes on Iran at night, but officials adjusted the plan based on the CIA intelligence, according to the Times.
While Israel's Ministry of Defense is located in Tel Aviv, the seat of government is in Jerusalem. The CIA is located in Langley, Va., but for good reason the article does not refer to "Langley and Tel Aviv." The correct formulation is "Washington and Jerusalem."
The identical error also appeared in additional articles yesterday including "Iranian cultural center in Ecuador attacked amid Middle East tensions," which misfired:
Iranian supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei was killed in the strikes on Tehran, state media confirmed Sunday, and Washington and Tel Aviv have vowed to seek regime change in the Islamic republic.
Similarly, a third AFP article March 1, continued to hammer away with the Tel Aviv fallacy ("Iran prepare for Women's Asian Cup as bombs drop on homeland"):
Iran's 26-strong squad arrived on the Gold Coast days before the strikes on Saturday killed supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei as Washington and Tel Aviv seek to topple the Islamic republic.
Among the media outlets which have corrected this error in the past are Reuters (multiple times), New York Times, The Hill, Fox, Newsweek, U.S. News & World Report, Deutsche Welle, CNN and Alhurra in Arabic, and NPR, and many others.
Yesterday, CAMERA staff informed the news agencies of the misreporting in their "mostly careful wording." As of this writing, neither AP nor AFP have corrected.
Times of Israel commendably corrected after having received notification from CAMERA staff about the AFP error on their site. The corrected article on the ToI site now rightly cites "Washington and Jerusalem" ("IDF says dozens of top Iranians killed within seconds of Khamenei as CIA role emerges").
Watch this space for news of additional corrections.
March 2 Update, 2:25 pm ET: [*OUTLET*] Corrects
After CAMERA's communication with editors and publication of the post, AP corrected its article so to make clear that "Washington and Tel Aviv" was the language of the Russian Foreign Ministry, placing that phrase in quotation marks and attributing it to its source. The updated text now states:
The ministry accused “Washington and Tel Aviv” of “hiding behind” concerns about Iran’s nuclear program while actually pursuing regime change.
In addition, a note appended to the bottom of the article commendably informs readers:
This story was first published on Feb. 28, 2026. It was updated on March 2, 2026, to make clear that a Russian statement on the strikes itself used Tel Aviv as a stand-in for Israel.
The correction appeared in more than three dozen secondary media outlets including The Washington Times, WTOP News (DC), San Francisco Chronicle, Seattle Times, Baltimore Sun, and Winnipeg Free Press. As of this writing, the Spanish version of the article has yet to be corrected.
This article was updated on March 3 to note the dozens of secondary corrections.