"Describing it as the “Hamas-run” Health Ministry is not a neutral designation; it is a politically loaded term that portrays Palestinian hospitals as suspicious and untrustworthy — as if the facts must first pass through a filter of suspicion."
June 16, 2025
To the Global News Regina newsroom,
I’m writing on behalf of Canadians for Justice and Peace in the Middle East (CJPME) regarding your news segment that aired on Sunday, June 15, 2025 at 22:15.
At 22:16, the reporting states that “the hamas run health ministry says at least 41 palestinians were killed by airstrikes saturday night into Sunday”
Regardless of one’s opinion of Hamas, it is the de facto governing authority in the occupied Gaza Strip. Naturally, the Palestinian Health Ministry in Gaza operates under its jurisdiction — as any civil institution would under a local government.
Describing it as the “Hamas-run” Health Ministry is not a neutral designation; it is a politically loaded term that portrays Palestinian hospitals as suspicious and untrustworthy — as if the facts must first pass through a filter of suspicion.
This framing also undermines the credibility of the medical data they provide, and worse, feeds into anti-Palestinian bias. It primes audiences to see Palestinians not as victims, but as suspects — less deserving of empathy, less human.
This double standard is glaring. When Israelis are killed, their deaths are reported as fact — no qualifiers, no insinuations. Yet when Palestinians are killed, the deaths are routinely qualified with the phrase: “according to the Hamas-run Health Ministry.”
A hospital is a hospital, is it not?
In the name of fair and accurate reporting — as outlined in the Canadian Association of Journalists’ guidelines — I urge you to stop using the phrase “Hamas-run.” Instead, simply say the “Palestinian Health Ministry in Gaza.”
I await your response.
Canadians for Justice and Peace in the Middle East / Canadiens pour la Justice et la Paix au Moyen-Orient