By Chloe Baker, Senior Opinions Editor
I wish I could say I was surprised when I opened up my phone to a New York Times article with the headline “How Israel’s Army uses Palestinians as Human Shields.” Did I mistakenly subscribe to Al-Jazeera? Had the New York Times suddenly been purchased by Qatari controlled media?
I’ve always been aware of the New York Times’ and other major news outlets’ anti-Israel bias, but this article seemed absurd. Taking one of the most well known tactics of Hamas – using Palestinians as human shields – and turning it around to completely place the blame on Israel seemed ridiculous. Yet, over a year into Israel’s war against radical Islam, I’ve accepted the fact that I will see more people and media outlets side with terrorism than I will see siding with those who are trying to eradicate it.
The Times’ “exposè” goes through multiple instances where Palestinians were supposedly used as “human shields” by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) in scenarios where they were tasked with searching for booby trapped areas, investigating for explosives set by Hamas, and scouting tunnel networks that the IDF believed Hamas fighters were hiding in. Even The Times admitted that “the extent and scale” of such operations they were reporting on were “unknown.”
Why report on something that you can’t completely confirm? While these instances are unfortunate, why has The Times never published an exposè on the ways Hamas uses its very own Palestinians as human shields in their 36 year attempt to annihilate the State of Israel?
Since Hamas’s Gaza takeover in 2007, the terrorist organization has proudly used its civilians as human shields and as an extension of their terrorist army. While there are many awful things I can say about the terrorist organization, one thing I can admit is that they can be quite intelligent. Hamas knows that Israel tries its hardest to avoid civilian casualties by implementing strategies such as using precision guided munitions (PGM’s), dropping leaflets warning civilians to evacuate, sending millions of text messages to notify civilians to leave combat areas, and even abandoning airstrikes due to mass amounts of civilians being present in targeted areas.
Additionally, Hamas wants the Western media and public to sympathize with them when these civilian deaths occur, even though Hamas leaders themselves show no sympathy when their own people are killed. This has been proven crystal clear over the past year with Hamas leaders living large in Qatari hotels, and with the fact that while he was alive and avoiding the fighting in the safety of Hamas built tunnels, Yahya Sinwar, the Oct. 7 mastermind, did not come out of hiding nor surrender despite the thousands of deaths in Gaza. Sinwar made it clear; the people of Gaza are sacrifices he was willing to make.
To Hamas, these large civilian casualties, partially caused by their human-shielding efforts, are an opportunity to convince the West of their innocence, and turn yet again another blind eye to the atrocities the Iranian proxy has committed. According to the Geneva Convention, facilities like schools, hospitals, and places of worship should be protected and are not to be used for military purposes, yet, this is exactly what has been done and continues to be done in Gaza.
In November 2023, the IDF found a command center, weapons and combat gear belonging to Hamas hidden in Gaza’s biggest hospital. In February, the IDF also found a Hamas data center, complete with an electrical room, industrial battery packs, living quarters, and weapons under the Gaza Strip UNRWA headquarters facility. The entrance to the tunnel where this center sat, was located under an UNRWA school. Most recently, the entrance to the tunnel where six Israeli hostages were tragically murdered, was inside of a children’s bedroom with Mickey Mouse and Snow White paintings on the walls. These three instances greatly align with the philosophy of Palestinian MP, Fathi Hamas, who said in 2008 that “for the Palestinian people, death has become an industry… This is why they have formed human shields of the women, the children, the elderly and the mujahideen (guerilla fighters).”
Even when Israel goes above and beyond to warn civilians of incoming attacks, the Palestinian leadership discourages its people from listening, going as far as calling those who do evacuate to “return immediately and stay there… Israel’s warnings are nothing but psychological warfare… by leaving your houses you assist the enemy to fulfill its plans, that is, annihilating your belongings and houses.”
While The Times went into detail and continues to paint the scene of the Israeli military being the “bad guy,” they seem to ignore all such instances where the cards have been reversed. The Times decided to highlight a number of isolated incidents carried out by the IDF, ones they cannot even comment on the exact extent of, while blatantly ignoring Hamas’s years of building up terror infrastructure and using civilian areas, like hospitals, mosques and schools to enable civilian casualties. They accused the Israeli military of forcing Palestinians to search for explosives set by Hamas, but have nothing to say regarding why the explosives were put there in the first place.
Maybe if media outlets like The Times were more concerned with eradicating terror and putting an end to this war, rather than inflating Sinwars ego by playing into Hamas’s PR campaign, the world would be a more informed and just place.
Photo Caption: The Office of The New York Times
Photo Credit: Jakayla Toney / Unsplash