The Washington Post needs to learn that turning to terrorists for the truth isn’t such a great idea.
The newspaper took to the social media platform X on Tuesday to issue what had to be a humiliating correction after it accepted as gospel a story peddled by the Hamas terrorist outfit about an alleged Israeli massacre of Palestinians at an aid station in Gaza.
It turned out, there was one key element missing from the coverage.
“The article failed to make clear if attributing the deaths to Israel was the position of the Gaza health ministry or a fact verified by The Post,” the newspaper’s correction stated.
Correction: We’ve deleted the post below because it and early versions of the article didn’t meet Post fairness standards.
The background: Early versions of the article on Sunday stated that Israeli troops had killed more than 30 people near a U.S. aid site in Gaza, with the… pic.twitter.com/KseRXgJn6A
— The Washington Post (@washingtonpost) June 3, 2025
And maybe even worse: “… The Post didn’t give proper weight to Israel’s denial and gave improper certitude about what was known about any Israeli role in the shootings.”
In other words, the newspaper of record in the capital of the United States published a story online that implicitly blamed the Israeli for the deaths of 31 people gathering to get food in a war-torn region — and it did it on the word of a terrorist group that exists to destroy the Jewish state.
Note the wording of the Post’s original X account: “At least 31 people were killed Sunday morning in southern Gaza, according to the Strip’s Health Ministry, when Israeli troops opened fire on crowds making their way to collect aid.”
The word “Hamas” never appears, simply an attribution to a euphemistic “Strip’s Health Ministry.” But the “health ministry” in Gaza is Hamas — the very group that started the current war with its Oct. 7, 2023, massacre of Israelis in a surprise attack.
And it’s entirely possible Hamas itself was behind the latest atrocity.
It seems to be an established fact that 31 Palestinians apparently did die in an attack on aid distribution site on Sunday.
However, as the Associated Press reported, the aid station where the shooting took place is run by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, a group supported by both Israel and the United States.
The Israel Defense Forces acknowledged that troops in the area had fired warning shots “at several suspects advancing toward them overnight,” according to the AP. But does it make sense that the Israeli military would attack at such a site?
According to the AP, the IDF also released a drone-footage video of armed men, not in uniform, shooting at civilians trying to collect aid. So, someone committed wanton slaughter of civilians in an apparent effort to make a political point.
Which side does that sound like?
Remarkably, the updated Washington Post report doesn’t do much to water down the implicit accusation that Israel was responsible for the deaths. Besides leaning heavily on Palestinian witnesses quoted blaming Israel, its summary headline makes it sound like Israel actually admitted to the killing:
“More than 170 were wounded as they headed to an aid point, the Gaza Health Ministry said. Israel’s military said troops had ‘acted to prevent several suspects from approaching.'”
Many social media users weren’t buying the Post’s spin:
After 2.4 millions read the lie, an irrelevant and soft sorry was published.
Only a class action lawsuite may help.
The legacy media have to pay billions in compensation. They must be hold accountable.
— Naftali Hirschl. (@NaftaliHirschl) June 3, 2025
It’s NOT BETTER. You put the headline that Israel shot and killed a bunch of people, well the full story is hidden behind a paywall.
— Anne Harris Wyckoff (@ASingeveryday) June 3, 2025
Liars!!!
— William Fuzi (@djbillyrae) June 4, 2025
WaPo being a mouthpiece for Hamas terrorists is wild.
— Keez Nuts (@KeezNuts) June 3, 2025
This isn’t the first time the Post has damaged its own credibility by peddling the Hamas side. It’s not the second time either.
It’s part of a long-running history of the Post, and the liberal Western media in general being sympathetic to the enemies of Israel — and the United States — to the point of outright fabrication.
Remember that Gaza hospital Israel supposedly blew up in 2023, killing 500 oh-so-innocent Palestinians? The reports caused a flood of outrage against Israel, of course. (And was duly reported by The Washington Post, of course.)
But it was a Palestinian terrorist rocket that did the damage, which was much less than originally reported, and nowhere near 500 people were killed. According to The Times of Israel, once the smoke cleared, estimates of deaths ranged from a high of 300 by U.S. intelligence officials to as low as 50, from an unnamed European official.
So the latest stream of Hamas propaganda out of Gaza is no outlier. And it’s hardly a surprise that Western outlets are willing to be spoon-fed Islamist lies if they make Israel look bad.
But if a news gathering organization like the Post has even a passing interest in reporting on reality rather than anti-Israel fantasies, it needs to learn that turning to terrorists for gospel truth is a road to journalistic hell.
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