The Pulitzer Prize has been accused of “desecrating the memory” of Oct 7 victims after awarding a journalist who suggested Israelis could not be hostages.

Mosab Abu Toha, a Palestinian poet, was recognised by the Pulitzer committee for his “essays on the physical and emotional carnage in Gaza”.

However, Honest Reporting, a watchdog that monitors for anti-Israel bias, found Mr Toha had posted a string of social media posts in which he disparaged Israeli hostages.

In one he questioned how British-Israeli citizen Emily Damari, who was shot and abducted on Oct 7 2023 in the Kfar Aza kibbutz after Hamas gunmen stormed her home, could be considered a hostage.

“So this girl is called a ‘hostage?’ This soldier who was close to the border with a city that she and her country have been occupying is called a ‘hostage?’,” he wrote.

Ms Damari, who was released in January after more than 500 days held captive, responded by accusing Pulitzer of having “chosen to elevate a voice that denies truth, erases victims, and desecrates the memory of the murdered”.

“Mosab Abu Toha is not a courageous writer. He is the modern-day equivalent of a Holocaust denier. And by honouring him, you have joined him in the shadows of denial,” the 29-year-old wrote on X.

“This is not a question of politics. This is a question of humanity. And today, you have failed it.”