Today marks 20 years since Tuvia Grossman, the bloodied "Palestinian," appeared all over the media, leading to the creation of HonestReporting.
On Sep 30, 2000, The @nytimes, @AP and others published a photo of a bloodied young man seen near a club-wielding Israeli policeman.
The caption read: “An Israeli policeman and a Palestinian on the Temple Mount.”
The pose suggested that the Israeli policeman was responsible for the injuries of the “Palestinian” man in the foreground.
In reality, the man was not a Palestinian Arab at all, but a Jewish American yeshiva student named Tuvia Grossman. Grossman had been pulled from a taxi in Jerusalem by an Arab mob and severely beaten.
Similarly, from the picture the policeman seems to be threatening. In reality, the Israeli policeman pictured, a Druze Israeli called Gideon Tzefadi, was actually standing over Grossman and *defending* him from the mob.
Seeing his son's picture in the @NYTimes, Alan Grossman sent the following letter to the newspaper: “…that Palestinian is actually my son, Tuvia Grossman, a Jewish student from Chicago. He, and two of his friends, were pulled from their taxicab while traveling in Jerusalem…“
“...by a mob of Palestinian Arabs, and were severely beaten and stabbed. That picture could not have been taken on the Temple Mount because there are no gas stations on the Temple Mount and certainly none with Hebrew lettering.“
In response, the New York Times published a half-hearted correction which identified Tuvia Grossman as “an American student in Israel” — not as a Jew who was beaten by Arabs.
Responding to public outrage at the original error and the inadequate correction, @NYTimes reprinted Tuvia Grossman’s picture — this time with the proper caption — along with a full article detailing his near-lynching at the hands of Palestinians rioters.
The first “correction” also noted that “Mr. Grossman was wounded” in “Jerusalem’s Old City” — although the beating actually occurred in the Arab neighborhood of Wadi al Joz, not in the Old City.
For years after, the media distortion had an ongoing, real-life effect as Arab groups adopted Grossman’s photo in their propaganda campaigns, cynically using a bloodied Jew as a symbol of the Palestinian struggle.
Among others, an official Egyptian government website used the photo on its photo gallery, and the Palestinian Information Center incorporated Grossman’s photo into its homepage banner.
WATCH: A decade later, HonestReporting reunited Grossman with his rescuer, Gidon Tzefadi:
🧵 1/ The @nytimes just profiled Twitch streamer Hasan Piker, nephew of Young Turks founder Cenk Uygur. Apparently antisemitism runs in the family—not that you'd know it from this glowing piece labeling him a "progressive." Yes, the guy who called Hamas massacres "resistance."
2/ The NYT goes to great lengths to sanitize Piker’s bigotry, claiming he "criticized the Israeli government" and "challenged norms." Apparently, calling Orthodox Jews "inbred" and dehumanizing a Jew who disagreed with him as a "bloodthirsty pig dog" are just norm-challenging.
3/ NYT calls Piker’s antisemitism mere "diatribes against the Zionist movement"—an absurdly tame way to describe a man who excused Hamas's rape and murder spree on Oct 7, saying "Palestinian resistance is not perfect." Apparently mass rape is a minor misstep to NYT’s new darling.
Hamas built an underground city. We built the map.🧵
Our new tool geo-locates 37 miles of Hamas’ tunnel network using open-source data—marking the first interactive map exposing the terror grid beneath Gaza.
Hamas spent 15 years and $1 billion creating this underground empire—built under hospitals, homes, schools, mosques, and graveyards.
Israel gets blamed for destruction.
But Hamas built terror into Gaza’s civilian infrastructure.
🧵1/
How does a publicly funded outlet like @abcnews get away with broadcasting this Easter-week pile of propaganda?
Let’s break it down — because reporter @MattDoran91 clearly needs a crash course in journalism, not just social media scrolling.
2/ ABC reports that Christians were “corralled” and “beaten” by Israeli police outside the Church of the Holy Sepulchre — all apparently based on one viral video Doran spotted on social media.
3/ Doran claims Palestinian Christians were “pushed, shoved, and threatened.” Based on what?
What didn’t make it in? A police statement. Or the viral posts debunking earlier footage. Or the weeks of planning to safely host thousands at the Holy Fire ceremony.
🦁 ZIONIST BEASTS?
From bees to boars, sharks to spy eagles—some media outlets and influencers are convinced Mossad has turned the animal kingdom into a covert ops unit.
Let’s look at some of the wildest animal conspiracy theories.🧵
As Jews celebrate Passover at the Western Wall, @Independent's version of an @AP story is littered with historical & geographical inaccuracies.
Elevating the status of the Wall omits the Jewish connection to its actual holiest site - the Temple Mount.
Let's take a look. 🧵
Judaism's holiest site is the Temple Mt. The Western Wall is the holiest site where Jews are currently allowed to pray.
King Solomon's Temple stood, not on the area of the Western Wall, but on the Temple Mt. itself.
And "Cohen's blessing?" Time to stop using Google Translate!🤣
The paved area of the Western Wall Plaza is not a remnant of the Second Temple. It is simply the area adjacent to the Western Wall, which, itself, is the remnant of a retaining wall of the Temple Mount.
Hamas uses hospitals as shields—and the media lets them.
Al-Ahli Hospital in Gaza was the latest example. Hamas turned it into a command center. Israel struck it. And the headlines? They focused on “lack of evidence.”
Let’s break it down.🧵
Instead of asking why Hamas was exploiting a hospital for terror operations, outlets like NPR, NYT, and CNN focused on the IDF not “offering proof” fast enough.
The media’s instinct to doubt Israel—rather than question Hamas—tells you everything.
This isn’t the first time.
Back in October 2023, Hamas blamed Israel for bombing Al-Ahli and claimed hundreds of deaths.
But U.S. intel showed it was a misfired rocket by Palestinian Islamic Jihad. And the media still ran with Hamas’ version.