Media Watchdog clarifies: ‘Raising Questions’ on photographer-hamas insinuations

The executive director of an Israeli media watchdog organization says it was simply “raising questions” by publicly wondering whether Palestinian photojournalists who documented the Oct. 7 Hamas attack in Israel — and sent some of the first images of its aftermath to a watching world — had been tipped off in advance that it would happen.
The report by the group Honest Reporting, however, had serious ramifications at a time of war.It led two Israeli politicians to suggest the journalists be killed. Several of the world’s biggest news organizations — CNN, The New York Times, The Associated Press and Reuters — issued statements Thursday denying they knew about the attack ahead of time.
Honest Reporting, which describes itself as an organization devoted to fighting media disinformation about Israel and Zionism, did not specifically make those accusations against the companies. It did, however, suggest that freelance photographers whose work from that day was used by the outlets might have known.
“Is it conceivable to assume that journalists’ just happened to appear early in the morning at the border without prior coordination with the terrorists?” Honest Reporting wrote on its website Wednesday. “Or were they part of the plan?”
Photos that moved that day showed Hamas escaping to Gaza with kidnapped Israeli citizens, Hamas attackers climbing on a disabled Israeli tank, images of Hamas invaders outside a kibbutz and buildings burning. Gil Hoffman, executive director of Honest Reporting and a former reporter for The Jerusalem Post, admitted Thursday the group had no evidence to back up that suggestion. He said he was satisfied with subsequent explanations from several of these journalists that they did not know.
“They were legitimate questions to be asked,” Hoffman said. Despite the name “Honest Reporting,” he said, “we don’t claim to be a news organization.”
The New York Times said that Yousef Masoud, whose photographs of an Israeli tank captured by Hamas were used by the newspaper and AP, did not know. His first photographs that day were filed 90 minutes after the attack began.