A screenshot of CNN's Qatar feature called, The Foundation. Photo: CNN / Screenshot.

The objectivity of CNN’s coverage of Israel’s Operation Protective Edge against Hamas in Gaza came under question when it was revealed on Sunday that the all-news channel recently launched a paid “advertising feature” section for Qatar, the major funder of Hamas, including links to a magazine and a feature program about Qatar to be broadcast on CNN.

The site links to a Qatar-focused magazine called ‘The Foundation‘ and describes ‘Inside the Middle East,’  “a 30-minute monthly feature program on CNN that seeks to capture the dynamism and broad range of cultural diversity in countries across the Middle East.”

Blogger Elder of Ziyon, who flagged the connection on Sunday, wrote, “Does anyone at CNN have a problem taking money from the country that bankrolls Hamas? Is there any question that this will affect CNN’s already poor objectivity?”

CNN’s New York City office was picketed last week by throngs of Israel supporters who called out the broadcaster for the continual spin in its reporting to somehow favor Hamas, the Gaza-based terror organization that preaches Al Qaeda’s message of jihad and death, over Israel, the only multi-cultural democracy in the Middle East.

In the conflict, the role of Qatar, which also funds the Al-Jazeera news network, made famous because it was the first to broadcast Al Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden’s calls for terror, was an issue during the talks for a cease-fire between Israel and Hamas, which Qatar and Turkey tried to broker against a competing initiative from Egypt. Qatar has offered Hamas access to its unlimited oil resources to rebuild, but Israel questioned its neutrality in pushing a cease-fire that only echoed Hamas’s maximalist demands rather than address Israel’s security concerns.

Israel also opposed Qatar sending money without restrictions, as Hamas seems to use the cash for purchasing more weapons and was found to use building materials to construct its underground terror tunnel network.

Indeed, Khaled Mashaal, head of Hamas’s political wing, lives in exile in Doha, Qatar, in one of the most expensive residential towers in the world, with many reports during the conflict focusing on the two to five billion dollars in international aid that he’s absconded with since Hamas took over in Gaza, in 2007.