False claims and consequences

(JNS) — This has not been a good week for the State of Israel or the Jewish people.

Sarah Milgrim, 26, and Yaron Lischinsky, 30, two young, promising members of the staff of the Israeli embassy, were brutally murdered as they were leaving a reception at the Capital Jewish Museum in Washington, D.C.

This sort of abominable antisemitic atrocity is what occurs when America’s young people are constantly indoctrinated by academics of the “woke” far left and the highly biased left-wing media.

Our educational institutions have been fortified by immeasurable funding from the government of Qatar, which hosts university programs in its Education City, in the middle of Doha. Education City is the Qatar-based home for overseas programs from Carnegie Mellon University, Georgetown University, Northwestern University, Texas A&M University, the Virginia Commonwealth School of Arts and the Weill Cornell College of Medicine. One can be certain that on these campuses, one is not learning Jeffersonian democracy.

Qatar leads the foreign funding of any nation to U.S. educational institutions. They are also responsible for extremely anti-Israel, antisemitic curriculum guides for teachers of students in kindergarten through 12th grade. In Qatar, children are taught that Hamas is a legitimate movement to “oppose the existence of Israel.” Their textbooks are imbued with antisemitism, saying, among other things, that Jews were responsible for the rise of the Nazi party in Germany, and Jews control the global economy.

As Yigal Carmon, founder and president of MEMRI, the Middle East Media Research Institute, has often remarked, “Qatar is anything but an honest broker. Qatar and Hamas is one and the same.”

Beyond that, U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer has suspended trade relations with Israel, with Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney and French President Emmanuel Macron chiming in with a joint statement calling on Israel to stop its military operations in Gaza and immediately supply more humanitarian aid there.

Much of the public outcry has to do with the highly inflated casualty numbers that are published by Hamas, which the world simply accepts as true. Jacqui Peleg, director of Imshin, a project documenting life in Gaza, told an Israeli news outlet, “They’ve talked about starvation throughout the war, but I keep seeing other images.” Peleg also said, “The people of Hamas have been playing a delicate game for years. The people of Hamas, and those tied to it, have always lived well.”

What is the anatomy of this deception?

The director of humanitarian aid for the United Nations, Tom Fletcher, issued an erroneous statement on BBC Radio on May 20 that 14,000 Gazan babies would die without sufficient humanitarian aid from Israel. He later retracted that statement. As did the BBC.

But, of course, it was too late. The international community had already swallowed the idea that Israel is responsible for mass starvation in Gaza. As Mark Twain was credited with saying, a lie goes halfway around the world before the truth has a chance to tie its shoes.

Egypt’s minister of foreign affairs, Badr Abdelatty, claimed that “Israel was using starvation and collective punishment against the Palestinian people.” Sharing a border with the Gaza Strip, Egypt has been able to help the people of Gaza for the last 18 years. Instead, it imported concrete for tunnels and armaments used to launch the Hamas-led terrorist attacks in southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023. Were Egyptians so blinded to reality that they were unable to see what was happening under their noses?

Qatari Prime Minister Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani stressed Monday the need for the international community “to confront the starvation policy pursued by the Israeli occupation” in the Gaza Strip.

Undoubtedly, Qatar has the wealth to be able to help its fellow suffering Sunni Muslim brethren.

To further complicate the narrative, Qatar’s funding network extends its reach into global media, ensuring that the narrative portraying Israel as a sole aggressor dominates headlines. This strategic use of soft power amplifies the grievances against Israel while deflecting attention from Hamas and its actions. In addition, the humanitarian aid ostensibly aimed at alleviating civilian suffering often ends up diverted to the military infrastructure of Hamas, reinforcing its ability to continue hostilities.

The international community, while vocal about the plight of Gazans, has largely ignored the role of regional powers like Egypt and Qatar in perpetuating the crisis. Egypt’s restrictive border policies and Qatar’s ideological support for Hamas contribute significantly to the current state of affairs in Gaza. A more balanced examination of these dynamics is urgently needed to hold all parties accountable and pave the way for a solution that prioritizes the well-being of civilians above political expediency and highly exaggerated, mendacious claims.

Amid the tangled web of accusations and counterclaims, humanitarian organizations face mounting pressure to navigate these complexities and deliver aid to those in actual dire need. Yet, their efforts are frequently obstructed by the political entanglements of organizations and nations whose goals are similar to those of Hamas and the diversion of aid for its selfish purposes. This erosion of trust in the mechanisms of relief has sparked calls for greater accountability and transparency.

The discourse surrounding Gaza remains fraught with complexity, as the interplay of global politics, media narratives and humanitarian aid creates an environment where truth is often a casualty of conflicting agendas. For the international community, the challenge lies not only in addressing immediate needs but also in confronting the systemic issues that perpetuate the crisis, including the highly exaggerated statements of people like the United Nations’ Fletcher. How can one extricate genuine concerns for civilian suffering from the broader geopolitical strategies at play?

Efforts to disentangle reality from propaganda necessitate a collective commitment to transparency, unbiased reporting and the prioritization of humanitarian principles over partisan interests. Nations, organizations and individuals must recognize the importance of scrutinizing all actors involved, including those operating behind the banner of the United Nations, who are being utilized to manipulate public perception or channel resources toward militarized ends.

Meaningful progress requires an honest examination of all factors. It means setting aside institutional biases, promoting honest dialogue beyond exaggerated rhetoric and ensuring aid reaches those in need and is not being used for Hamas’s political purposes or those of its enablers. This includes holding all actors accountable for their roles in perpetuating violence and suffering, from state sponsors to non-state entities that exploit humanitarian crises for political leverage.

Furthermore, media outlets and influencers, such as the BBC, bear a significant responsibility in shaping public opinion and, by extension, policy decisions. The dissemination of objective, fact-based narratives is essential to cut through the fog of propaganda that often obscures the realities on the ground. Misleading or exaggerated claims only serve to deepen divisions and complicate efforts to resolve the crisis.

Unless the exaggerations, distortions and wide-ranging perfidies stop, the global community, whether it is aware of it or not, is aiding and assisting the Hamas terrorist organization. This is not only a moral imperative but a practical necessity to dismantle the infrastructures of violence that thrive on misappropriated funds, virtue-signaling and genuine compassion.

Equally essential is fostering a culture of accountability at international forums such as the United Nations and the International Criminal Court, where the actions and policies of all stakeholders—whether state actors, non-state actors or international organizations—are scrutinized and debated openly. A refusal to gloss over uncomfortable truths will be pivotal in dismantling the system of incentives that currently enables the status quo to persist.

Without this, there may be many more tragedies, such as that which befell Milgrim and Lischinsky.

Sara N. Stern is the founder and president of the Endowment for Middle East Truth, a think tank that specializes in the Middle East.