NYT op-ed calls #EyalGiladNaftali "settlers." Fact checking is SO 1970s.

The New York Times published an op-ed by Ali Jarbawi on Wednesday that started off this way:

The murder of three settlers in the West Bank has given Israel the excuse it was waiting for to set a huge military operation in motion.

Apparently, the "Newspaper of Record" cannot be bothered to do even the most cursory fact checking (two of the boys lived within the Green Line.)

The rest of the op-ed is predictably stupid:

Even before the bodies of the missing young men were discovered on Monday, an Israeli incursion into Palestinian territories was in full swing. There were break-ins at houses, offices and universities, hundreds of arrests and several killings across the West Bank. The action has now expanded to the demolition in Hebron of the homes of two suspects in the case, and extensive bombardment of the Gaza Strip.

This can’t be explained as merely a reaction to the killing of the three Israelis, who were abducted on June 12.

Because this former PA Minister of Planning and Administrative Development and the former Minister of Higher Education is an expert in police and army investigations, no doubt. If this clearly non-partisan Palestinian Arab politician cannot be trusted to tell the truth, who can?

Jarbawi claims that Israel's frantic attempts to find the boys was really about Israel blaming Abbas for the collapse of the recent peace negotiations and the PLO's joining international organizations and signing international treaties.

Of course, Jarbawi doesn't mention the fact that the suspects in the case have clear ties to Hamas and that Israel does not have an interest in ruining its security relationship with the PA.

While Jarbawi's thesis is ridiculous, that doesn't automatically make it unsuitable for an op-ed. Making up facts (and incidentally dehumanizing the victims) should make any editor pause a little, though, before deciding to publish.

The New York Times did not publish a single op-ed supporting Israel's right to search for the missing boys.  On the contrary, they published one by Roger Cohen called "Cycles of Revenge" that not only assumes that Jews are responsible for the  death of Mohammed Abu Khdeir but also that "Netanyahu, without producing evidence, has blamed Hamas for the murders" - never mind that the suspects who disappeared on the same day the boys were killed have ties to Hamas and the boys were found in the field of a family that has perpetrated dozens of Hamas terror attacks.

It sure seems like facts are not very important to the New York Times.

(h/t Ronald, David G)