The accusation was of rare seriousness: “American Press, CNN, the New York Times and Reuters had journalists on board with Hamas terrorists during the October 7 massacre,” shared, Thursday, November 9, the official account of the Hebrew State on X, managed by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, before deleting his message.
The Israeli minister attached to the war cabinet, Benny Gantz, went so far as to denounce criminal collusion: “The journalists, who it turns out had prior knowledge of the massacres, and yet chose to remain passive spectators while children were brutally killed, are no different from terrorists and should be treated as such,” he said, nationalist media outlet Arutz Sheva reported.
No evidence has come to support these accusations, denied by the major American media and by the minute-by-minute reconstruction of the events. Through the voice of its executive director, Gil Hoffman, the pressure group Honest Reporting, at the origin of the accusations, has since backtracked, admitted to having no proof and explained that it had “simply raised questions”.
The Israeli Western media monitoring site Honest Reporting, which relies in particular on photos from the Associated Press (AP) and Reuters, explains in an article published on November 8 that six journalists who covered the day of October 7 were able to photograph the passage of Palestinians through the cut fences, as well as the fighting at the border. They are Hatem Ali, Hassan Eslaiah, Mohammed Fayq, Ali Mahmoud, Yousef Masoud, Abu Mostafa and Yasser Qudih.
“What were they doing there so early, on a Saturday morning that should have been ordinary? Was this coordinated with Hamas? Did the respectable news agencies that published their photos approve of their presence in enemy territory, alongside the infiltrating terrorists? Have photojournalists who work freelance for other media outlets, like CNN and the New York Times, notified these outlets? », asks the site, which accuses them of being “infiltrated”.
In the hours that followed, a photograph began to circulate of Hassan Eslaiah, one of the incriminated photographers, dating from 2018, as he kissed Hamas leader Yahya Sinouar. In another video, he films himself in front of a burning Israeli tank, without a “press” jacket, or even goes up a road on a motorbike, holding what appears to be a grenade.
Honest Reporting is an organization dedicated to combating alleged anti-Israel bias in Western media. In the past, he has notably denounced several journalists who have shared messages of an anti-Semitic nature on social networks, or who have demonstrated links with Islamist movements, such as Hezbollah or Hamas. His articles notably led CNN to break off its collaboration with Idris Muktar Ibrahim, a producer who had tweeted that he was “on Hitler’s side.”
However, it is not a journalistic site, but more of a pro-Israeli pressure group, which sometimes relays elements of propaganda, such as the idea that the images of Palestinian victims are staged aimed at manipulate international opinion.
The Israeli nationalist right accuses Western media of always siding with Palestine. Jonathan Conricus, spokesperson for the Israeli army, reacted to the publication of Honnest Reporting by explaining that he had always had the feeling that “Gawi freelancers working for the main Western media are at best controlled by Hamas, or more likely are totally part of Hamas propaganda,” and lamented that “so much of what the world knows about Gaza is based on these charlatans.” Entry to the enclave is still prohibited to the press by the Israeli army.
While it is possible that in the event of a conflict, journalists embedded with the army have knowledge of military plans, there is no evidence that this was the case on October 7, during the terrorist attack on Hamas. The speed with which photographers were able to get to the border can be explained by the small size of the Gaza Strip, 365 km2, roughly the size of a metropolis like Toulon or half of Madrid.
Julie Pace, head of AP, recalled that as soon as the rain of missiles launched into Israel from Gaza in the early morning, “it was clear that something serious was happening.” This is also what Hassan Eslaiah told Libération, who was able to reconstruct his morning with his posts on social networks, from a first video of rocket fire at 6:41 a.m. to his crossing of the border during a Facebook live at 8:27 a.m., until he arrived on a motorcycle at a kibbutz, where the bodies of murdered Israeli civilians were already lying, around 9:30 a.m.
In a dispatch, AP stressed that the first photos taken that day by its colleague, Yousef Masoud, “were taken ninety minutes after the attack began”, weakening the thesis of collusion. Reuters published photos taken by Mohammed Fayq, Abu Mostafa and Yasser Qudih, taken more than forty-five minutes after the announcement that Hamas attackers had crossed the border. The agency confirms to Libération that the metadata of the first published photographs, taken at 8:29 a.m., show that almost two hours passed between the first rocket fire and these photos.
The New York Times, which did not publish photos of the journalists cited that day, defends its collaborator Yousef Masoud, who immortalized for AP an Israeli tank on fire. He “did what photojournalists always do during major events, documenting the tragedy as it unfolded,” said the American daily.
AP and CNN both ended their collaboration with Hassan Eslaiah, the photojournalist photographed near the Hamas leader in an apparently complicit posture. The photo dates from 2018, during a meeting between Hamas and journalists, the photographer assures Libération. He himself broadcast it in January 2020 for self-promotion, “to prove the authenticity” of his reports and show his “access to the leaders of various Palestinian factions”. “While we have, to date, no reason to doubt the journalistic accuracy of the work he did for us, we have decided to suspend all our ties with him,” CNN said.
For the rest, the four American media outlets cited all denied having any knowledge of the planned terrorist attacks in Israel on October 7. In a statement, the New York Times called the accusations “false and outrageous.” He also said he was “deeply concerned” about the threats these allegations pose to freelance war photojournalists, who cover conflict zones at the risk of their lives. Thirty-nine journalists and collaborators have been killed since October 7, the most tragic monthly toll since the Committee to Protect Journalists began counting them in 1992.
