On one side we have a mature, professional government and army in a democracy with a vigorous free press unafraid to call out abuses and lies.. One that has are checks and balances, a strong judicial system and an independent legal branch of the army to ensure that the law is upheld.
On the other side we have kidnappers, murderers, rapists - people who literally brag about targeting Jews. An internationally recognized terrorist group whose very charter says its goal is to eradicate all Jews. A group that has a record of jailing or murdering critics, and threatening anyone who says anything they don't like. Their military forces' major defensive objective is to cynically use and endanger their own people to protect themselves.
The track records of both sides telling the truth - and correcting mistakes - are not remotely comparable. Yet we have the media that treats the claims of both sides with exactly equal weight.
The New York Times says:
In a video taken at the hospital, a military spokesman, Lt. Col. Jonathan Conricus, displayed caches of guns, ammunition, protective vests and Hamas military uniforms, some of which, he said, had been hidden behind M.R.I. machines and others in nearby storage units.The New York Times was unable to verify the provenance of the weapons and equipment in the images or assess the claim of the command center’s existence.
In other words, according to the NYT, the IDF may have faked the entire video. They may have planted AK-47s in the hospital. The entire operation of going into Shifa Hospital may have been an elaborate scam, just to smear Hamas' sterling reputation by accusing them of hiding militants in a hospital, which has been reported by independent sources for 15 years.
There is no problem with being skeptical - both sides realize this is an information war and try to get their narratives in the forefront. But only one side suffers consequences if they are found to be deceiving the media. The downside of Israeli statements like this one being found out to be untrue are huge, and the upside of lying is fairly minimal.
For Hamas, there is no downside of lying. Because the media still gives everything they say the same legitimacy as Israel's statement, no matter how many times they have been shown to maliciously and repeatedly lie.
Casting doubt on the veracity of IDF claims, especially in Gaza, is saying that Jews cannot be trusted. The Israelis spokespeople are just as reliable as those of genocidal Hamas, no more and no less. Context and history and motivation are all irrelevant.
In fact, to the New York Times, IDF claims are much less reliable. They have mounted multiple investigations questioning IDF claims during this war, but as far as I can tell they have not given serious resources to proving Hamas war crimes since the events of 10/7.
This is not even-handedness. This is slyly accusing Jews of subterfuge and lies while giving a terrorist group equal, or sometimes greater, legitimacy. I cannot recall the newspaper being this skeptical about official government statements from the UK or France. Only the Jewish state is given such treatment. Only for Jews is the audience told that their statements cannot be corroborated, and are therefore suspect.
Placing a moral equivalence between Israel and Hamas is antisemitism hiding under the pretense of honest journalism. And it stinks just as bad as all other antisemitism does.
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