This media trend has frequently taken the form of uncritically repeating Israeli claims that the Palestinian Health Ministry in Gaza is inflating the Palestinian death toll, or has otherwise cast suspicion on the credibility of Palestinian death toll reporting.
To the CBC team,
I am writing on behalf of Canadians for Justice and Peace in the Middle East (www.cjpme.org) to raise concerns about a troubling media pattern we have identified while monitoring Israel’s genocidal campaign against Palestinians in Gaza over the past two years – a genocide that has been documented by leading human rights organizations such as Amnesty International and is the subject of South Africa’s case before the International Court of Justice, which seeks to hold Israel accountable for acts of genocide against the Palestinian people.
This media trend has frequently taken the form of uncritically repeating Israeli claims that the Palestinian Health Ministry in Gaza is inflating the Palestinian death toll, or has otherwise cast suspicion on the credibility of Palestinian death toll reporting.
For example, the CBC article published an article (November 18, 2023) titled: “The challenges of counting the dead in the ongoing Israel-Hamas war” stating the following:
“reports suggest that medical professionals relay news of recorded deaths to the health ministry in Gaza. Yet Israeli officials and even U.S. President Joe Biden expressed skepticism of Gaza-reported totals.”
This is particularly concerning given that, just yesterday, the Israeli army publicly accepted the accuracy of the Palestinian Ministry of Health’s death toll figures in Gaza, after years of manufacturing doubt on their reporting.
While we understand that this information has only recently been announced, Israel has a long and well-documented history of spreading misinformation that media outlets have too often amplified without sufficient scrutiny. One of the most egregious examples was the widespread circulation of false claims regarding beheaded infants following the October 7, 2023 Hamas-led attacks, claims that were later debunked but had already been amplified by the media.
This pattern also reflects a well-documented Israeli strategy of manufacturing doubt to evade accountability for committing war crimes and crimes against humanity, crimes that have contributed to circumstances under which Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu now faces an arrest warrant from the International Criminal Court.
In light of this, we urge CBC News to issue an editor’s note clearly stating that the Palestinian Ministry of Health’s casualty figures in Gaza are credible and accurate. Furthermore, in future coverage, any assertions by the Israeli state or military officials that cast doubt on these figures should be explicitly identified as false, in the interest of accurate, fair, and ethical journalism, as outlined in Canadian Association of Journalists (CAJ) guidelines.