Smoke rises from Gaza after an explosion, as seen from the Israeli side of the border, April 14, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Amir Cohen

It was right there, on their website. For all to see. Evidence that a major American news outlet — one with prestige, resources, and supposedly rigorous editorial standards — had quietly published, almost word-for-word, what can only be described as a press release from a designated terrorist organization.

Earlier this month, CBS News ran a story about an alleged Israeli airstrike on a school in Gaza. The headline set the tone: “Israeli strike on Gaza school allegedly kills 31 Palestinians, many kids, but IDF says it hit Hamas.”

Already, the usual red flags: a suspiciously specific death toll, immediate emphasis on children among the casualties, and of course, the requisite skepticism toward the IDF’s explanation — all paired with the now-standard framing of an aggressive Israel recklessly targeting civilians, rather than Hamas.

According to CBS, the death toll was sourced from the “Civil Defense rescue agency in Gaza,” which in turn cited medical records from Al-Ahli Hospital — the same hospital that, just days after CBS published its report, was revealed to contain a Hamas operations center inside the facility. That’s right: inside the hospital. Just to give you an idea of the reliability of the sources CBS deems fit to cite.

And yet, rather than question the reliability of medical records emerging from a Hamas-controlled war zone — or pause to consider the well-documented strategy of placing multiple command centers in civilian institutions — CBS instead cast doubt on the IDF. Why? Because the IDF had issued similar warnings the day before, when targeting a different Hamas site. Apparently, the editorial team at CBS finds it hard to believe that a terror group that has ruled Gaza with an iron grip for nearly two decades might operate more than one military facility embedded in civilian infrastructure.

We know. Shocking. Almost as if tunnel networks, human shields, and base duplication are all part of Hamas’ war strategy.

But the real giveaway came in a line CBS quietly scrubbed from its article after publication — with no correction, no note, no admission. The line that read: “The death toll of the Israeli aggression has risen to 50,609 martyrs.” [emphasis added]

Yes, really. “Martyrs.” And “Israeli aggression.” Directly lifted from Hamas propaganda.

On April 4, @CBSNews referred to 50,000 Palestinian “martyrs” before quietly amending it, hoping nobody would notice.

Pro-tip: Don’t copy-paste Hamas press releases. pic.twitter.com/mV6qa8718u

— HonestReporting (@HonestReporting) April 14, 2025

At some point, a CBS journalist hit Ctrl+C on that phrasing and dropped it straight into a news story — no quotation marks, no attribution, no context. Just presented as plain, unqualified fact.

This is how warped coverage of Israel’s war with Hamas has become: ideologically blinkered or just plain lazy reporters sourcing claims from the most biased actors in the region and piping them directly into American living rooms under the banner of “journalism.”

We’ve seen it before. HonestReporting has documented how outlets like UPI routinely republish Hamas talking points. The BBC, The Guardian, NPR — all have quoted Hamas press officers and “health ministry” officials as if they were neutral observers rather than representatives of a proscribed terrorist organization.

This is how distortion becomes doctrine. This is how Hamas’ narrative — complete with inflated death tolls, blood-soaked victimhood, and cartoon-villain depictions of Israel — spreads far beyond Gaza’s borders.

When Western news outlets start parroting the language of groups banned in their own countries, it’s not just a lapse in editorial judgment. It’s complicity.

The author is a contributor to HonestReporting, a Jerusalem-based media watchdog with a focus on antisemitism and anti-Israel bias — where a version of this article first appeared.