The Washington Post released a belated statement addressing its Sunday story that cited Hamas officials to blame Israel for the killing of "over 30" Gazans near a humanitarian aid site. The Post said the story, which it first updated without explanation, did not meet its standards.
"Early versions of the article on Sunday stated that Israeli troops had killed more than 30 people near a U.S. aid site, with the headline attributing the action to ‘health officials,’" the Post tweeted in a "correction" note that is also affixed to the bottom of its piece.
"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 article and headline were updated on Sunday evening making it clear that there was no consensus about who was responsible for the shooting and that there was a dispute over that question."
The Post’s editors also addressed the paper’s reliance on Hamas sources rather than Israeli officials.
"While statements from Israel that it was unaware of injuries and that an initial inquiry indicated its soldiers didn’t fire at civilians near the site were included in all versions of the article, 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. The early versions fell short of Washington Post standards of fairness and should not have been published in that form."
Though the Post's original piece does quote the Israel Defense Forces as saying it was "unaware of injuries caused by IDF fire within the Humanitarian Aid distribution site," it did not refer to any "initial inquiry," according to an archived version.
The statement comes some 40 hours after the Post updated its initial story without an editor's note or correction notice. One of the authors, former Al Jazeera correspondent Louisa Loveluck, was part of the Post team named as a Pulitzer Prize finalist for international reporting. She celebrated the affair with a speech to the Post newsroom that condemned the "level of suffering" in Gaza but did not mention Hamas or the Israeli hostages. Loveluck also has a history of receiving editor's notes on Israel-related coverage.
She was the lead reporter on a since-corrected story alleging that Israel had a policy of separating Palestinian mothers from their children. An editor’s note on that report states that Loveluck and her team "incorrectly said that all Palestinian mothers who received authorization to leave Gaza for humanitarian reasons had to return to Gaza to reapply after their permits expire" and "neglected to seek comment from Israeli officials for this article."