Narrative Warfare: The New York Times and the Framing of Gaza

In a powerful exposé titled "The New York War Crimes: A Dossier," a coalition of writers opposed to the war on Gaza has accused The New York Times (NYT) of complicity in genocide through its coverage of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

The dossier, published by independent journalists and activists, alleges that the Times has systematically laundered misinformation, suppressed critical facts, and maintained editorial ties to Zionist organizations, thereby shaping public opinion in favor of Israeli military actions.

The dossier opens with a bold statement: The New York Times has served as a "mouthpiece for American imperialism," helping to manufacture elite consensus around foreign policy that supports Israel's military operations in Gaza. It identifies a pattern of biased reporting, selective framing, and omission of key facts that have contributed to the justification of war crimes.

The dossier meticulously documents the backgrounds of several prominent NYT figures, revealing deep personal and professional ties to Zionist organizations and Israeli institutions:

• Meredith Kopit Levien, CEO of The New York Times Company, has served on the advisory council of B'nai B'rith Youth Organization (BBYO), which promotes unwavering loyalty to Israel.
• Joe Kahn, Executive Editor, is linked to CAMERA, a Zionist media watchdog. He oversaw the controversial article "Screams Without Words," which falsely accused Hamas of mass rape.
• Thomas Friedman, long-time foreign affairs columnist, has personal ties to Israel dating back to his youth and lived in a home seized from Palestinians during the Nakba.
• Isabel Kershner, Jerusalem correspondent, is married to a former Israeli military strategist Hirsh Goodman and has two sons who served in the Israeli military. Goodman previously worked at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy (WINEP), a Zionist think tank founded in 1985 and run by former AIPAC executives.
• Patrick Kingsley, Jerusalem bureau chief since 2021, has been criticized for embedding with Israeli forces and altering coverage under pressure from pro-Israel groups that led to the targeted killings of the Palestinian poets, scholars, and teachers like Refaat Alareer by the Israelis.
• Ronen Bergman, contributor to the NYT Magazine, is a former Israeli intelligence officer and frequent speaker at AIPAC events.
• Natan Odenheimer, Jerusalem correspondent, served in Israel's elite Maglan commando unit for four years.
• Adam Rasgon who joined the NYT in 2024 previously worked at Zionist think tank Shalem Center, founded by one of Benjamin Netanyahu's close advisors and funded by Trump mega-donor Sheldon Adelson, and later at WINEP to 'disseminate the AIPAC line but in a way that would disguise its connections'. He cited them at least 17 times in his reporting without disclosure.
• Jodi Rudoren, editorial director of newsletters, lived in a home taken from the prominent Palestinian-born academic, physician and author Ghada Karmi's family during the Nakba and bought by Thomas Friedman for the Times in the 1980s. She has longstanding ties to Zionist organizations.
• David Leonhardt, opinion editor, has justified Israeli military actions and echoed official narratives about attacks on hospitals after October 2023 by insisting that 'there may be no way for Israel both to minimize civilian casualties and to eliminate Hamas,' and that 'Hamas is responsible for many of the civilian deaths' in Gaza. "In November 2023, Leonhardt disseminated Israel's narrative during the IOF's first invasion of Al-Shifa Hospital, where hundreds of displaced civilians had been sheltering, framing the assault on one of Gaza's most important hospitals as unfortunate but necessary."
• Bret Stephens, opinion columnist since 2017, works for a Zionist advocacy group, the dark- money Maimonides Fund, where he works as the editor-in-chief of its journal, Sapir, in a blatant violation of the Times ethical guidelines. He has appeared at events across the country with the America Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), the most influential Zionist lobby organization in the United States.
• David Brooks, columnist since 2003, defended Israel during its 2014 assault on Gaza, one of Israel's bloodiest assaults on Gaza, while his son served in the Israeli military. In one 2014 NPR interview, he claimed that exposing civilian casualties of Israel's attacks was a ploy for sympathy by the Palestinian people, arguing that 'Hamas has basically decided they want to see their own people killed as a propaganda coup.'
• Myra Noveck, long-time Jerusalem bureau staffer since 1999, has children in the Israeli military and is married to a Zionist writer Gershom Gorenberg.
• David Halbfinger, political editor, was described as the NYT's "most Israel-friendly" reporter and attends a synagogue that fundraises for Israel.

1. The Hannibal Directive Cover-Up

Despite widespread reporting in Israeli media, the NYT has failed to mention that Israel issued the Hannibal Directive on October 7th, the Israeli military doctrine that calls to kill other Israelis to prevent them from being taken hostage. On October 7, 2023, this directive contributed to the deaths of many Israelis. Yet, the NYT continues to blame Hamas exclusively for the casualties, omitting this critical context.

2. The Mass Rape Hoax

The NYT published the now-discredited article "Screams Without Words," alleging that Hamas weaponized sexual violence. The claims were refuted by forensic experts, family members of alleged victims, and the UN Human Rights Council, which found no credible evidence of rape. The article cited "sisters Y. and N. Sharabi, ages 13 and 16" as supposed victims of mass rape. However, a spokesperson for the Kibbutz Be'eri, where they were killed, came out and said, "No, they just - they were shot. I'm saying 'just,' but they were shot and were not subjected to sexual abuse."

Furthermore, the piece listed Gal Abdush as one of the main victims of Hamas rape, but multiple members of her family came out publicly to say she was not raped on October 7, 2023. Haartez reported that "At Shura Base, to which most of the bodies (from October 7th) were taken for purposes of identification, there were five forensic pathologists at work. In that capacity, they also examined bodies that arrived completely or partially naked in order to examine the possibility of rape.

According to a source knowledgeable about the details, there were no signs on any of those bodies attesting to sexual relations having taken place or of mutilation of genitalia."

Ironically, these false claims were used to justify actual sexual violence committed by Israeli forces against Palestinian detainees, including minors.

3. The Al Shifa Hospital Lie

The NYT echoed Israeli claims that Al Shifa Hospital was a Hamas command center. Investigations by Channel 4 and the UN found no supporting evidence. Instead, the hospital was subjected to airstrikes, raids, and mass detentions, rendering it non-functional. Palestinian doctors reported torture and abuse at Israeli detention centers, with Israeli medical personnel allegedly participating in or condoning the violence.

4. The Hamas Stealing Aid Lie

The NYT reported that Hamas stole UN aid, citing Israeli and U.S.-backed sources. However, a U.S. government analysis and later NYT admissions found no evidence of systematic theft. This narrative was used to justify the establishment of Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) "aid centers" that became sites of massacres, where over 1,000 Palestinians were killed while seeking food.

An IDF soldier stationed at one of these GHF aid centers told Haaretz, "It's a killing field. Where I was stationed, between one and five people were killed every day. They're treated like a hostile force - no crowd-control measures, no tear gas - just live fire with everything imaginable: heavy machine guns, grenade launchers, mortars. We open fire early in the morning if someone tries to get in line from a few hundred meters away, and sometimes we just charge at them from close range. But there's no danger to the forces, I'm not aware of a single instance of return fire. There's no enemy, no weapons".

Whistleblower Testimonies: A Glimpse into the Horror

One of them, Green Beret Lieutenant-Colonel Anthony Aguilar, who was hired to guard one of the GHF aid sites, said to BBC News: "I witnessed the Israeli defense forces shooting at the crowds of Palestinians. I witnessed the Israeli defense forces firing a main gun tank round from the Merkava tank into a crowd of people, destroying a car of civilians who were simply driving away from the site... In my entire career, have I never witnessed the level of brutality and use of indiscriminate and unnecessary force against a civilian population, an unarmed, starving population." He said, "Without question, I witnessed war crimes, I witnessed war crimes by the Israeli defense forces, without a doubt, using artillery rounds, mortar rounds, firing tank rounds into unarmed civilians, it's a war crime."

The Consequences of Complicity

This exposé demands a reckoning-not just with the NYT, but with the broader media ecosystem that whitewashes and enables genocidal violence. Consider the case of Bari Weiss, who founded The Free Press. Weiss once described the killing of 50 Palestinians, including children, as an "unavoidable burden" of Zionism's self-determination-a statement that would be unthinkable if made about Jewish victims. Yet, such rhetoric has not hindered her professional ascent. Instead, it has seemingly been rewarded.

The Free Press has repeatedly spread misinformation to defend Israel's actions in Gaza. It misrepresented UN data to downplay civilian deaths, denied the existence of famine despite mounting evidence, and falsely blamed Hamas for aid-seeker massacres later confirmed to be carried out by Israeli forces. The outlet also praised the controversial Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, which has since been implicated in widespread violence against starving civilians.

Beyond misinformation, The Free Press engages in more insidious propaganda. It has shifted its stance on attacks against Gaza's hospitals-from denial to justification-despite overwhelming evidence and admissions from the IDF. The outlet rarely acknowledges Palestinian suffering or the mounting death toll, instead lamenting the reputational damage to Israel.

Weiss herself has a history of promoting Islamophobic views. She rose to prominence by targeting Muslim professors at Columbia University and has repeatedly blamed Muslims for rising antisemitism in Europe. She has also promoted Ayaan Hirsi Ali, who espouses extreme views about Islam and Muslim immigrants. Weiss's support for Ali's rhetoric-calling Islam a "cult of death" and advocating for the closure of Muslim schools-would be unacceptable if directed at Judaism, yet it has not hindered her career.

Weiss and her outlet are reportedly in talks to sell The Free Press to CBS News for $200-$250 million, a move that could give her influence over the network's editorial direction. The elevation of Bari Weiss and The Free Press-despite their record of misinformation and inflammatory rhetoric-alongside the longstanding pro-Israel bias of institutions like The New York Times, signals a deeper crisis in journalism. As media power becomes increasingly concentrated in the hands of ideologically aligned corporations, the boundaries between truth and propaganda blur. In this climate, narratives that justify war and suppress accountability are not just tolerated-they're rewarded.

The public must remain critically vigilant, because when media giants dictate the terms of truth, the cost is not merely misinformation-it is complicity in injustice, and the silencing of those who suffer most. Dr. Siddiqui is a peace and human rights activist.