Haaretz is no better than the New Yorl Times. It is anti-Israeli agitprop from hard leftists. The Times I understand since they are 5,000 miles away. For the people who write for Haaretz it seems suicidal to take the side of the jihadists against your own people in the midst of an existential war.
Great work, Andrew... that Haaretz article was very disturbing, and it's been making lots of waves, so it's a relief to see some well-reasoned pushback. Thank you! And many thanks to your IDF sources too :)
Israeli society is in the midst of a hearty debate about the war, their internal society, and everything else under the sun. Your article, Andrew, is an excellent piece dispassionately examining the situation in a nuanced way. But who cares about nuance now? Everyhting has become so binary. The only way to overpower a hateful shouter is to shout louder. But that just invites and even louder retaliation. As so we eacalate the shouting, and any critical reasoning is lost in the noise.
Good clear balanced article. Had no real knowledge of Haaretz, certainly do now, difficult to comprehend their anti Israeli hard left stance, must be for those outside Israel surely?
As I read the Haaretz article, it appeared as borderline fifth column reporting. I am curious how Haaretz, as an indigenous news outlet, is supporting Israeli sovereignty.
After months of reading your reporting, Andrew, and comparing with my own military experience, your reporting is definitely honest and trustworthy. And so it is with this post.
Thank you for your diligence extra effort you take to provide us with balanced and honest perspectives during Israel's continued wars against the Islamists.
'But, as today’s revelations about the British SAS show, this is not solely an IDF phenomenon. As I have written before, armies recruit from societies. Societies contain both good and bad people.'
I don't understand how Israelis write and publish such unashamedly biased pieces against the very IDF that protects their own lives. As you say, there are bad apples in the IDF but to imply that they characterize the IDF as a whole is unfathomable. Why does Haaretz do it? For a political agenda isn't enough -- I don't understand.
I kind of get the positions of the international left (the three greatest sources of evil in the world are the US, Israel, and Saudi Arabia, in that order). I don't get Haaretz. But anyway, that's not the point I want to make. The point is, Israel, a democracy, has Haaretz. A disputatious dissident pain-in-the-ass publication is legal. I doubt there's anything comparable in a Muslim-led nation.
An excellent rebuttal. Very thoughtful and precise like a calm, layered meditation on military ethics, institutional behaviour, and journalistic responsibility. Your testimonial forms bridges between raw experience with analytical critique. It was touching how you orchestrate the voices of the soldiers against Haaretz’s portrayal - after all lets not forget these men are risking their lives here.
The recurring assertion that “not a word of hatred” was surprising In a setting marked by personal trauma and existential threat, one might expect hatred to surface, even subliminally. Its absence raises questions: is this emotional restraint a product of institutional messaging, psychological numbing, or ideological performance?
This is frustrating stuff. As someone 5000 miles away who just wants to know the facts so I can make an informed judgment of my own, I have Andrew Fox's word against the NYTimes, the Guardian... While I have come to believe that the NYTimes and Guardian have uncritically accepted and reported Hamas-influenced propaganda, that's still different from knowingly printing false eyewitness reports, which is Andrew's allegation here about Haaretz. Even though I want to believe Andrew's version, I can't simply dismiss the other reporting because it says things that I don't like to hear.
How can this be resolved? Is the NYTimes given the same access as Andrew was given?
That’s not my allegation at all. My allegation is that they’ve made no attempt to tell the other side of the story, no attempt to present a rounded picture, and have produced an unbalanced and manipulative hatchet job. Not that they haven’t published lies before (see Apaches on 7 October).
Hey just to chip in here. My reading was just that Andrew had his own experience with IDF troops in Gaza. He doesn’t say that the Haaretz sources are lying.
You have to decide how you’ll allow information to enter into your personal processing system. For example, Benny Morris - Israeli historian - doesn’t use oral testimony as a matter of methodology. Ask any cop, eye witness accounts are fundamentally flawed. Basically you can’t trust them. Read Homicide: A Year on the Killing Streets by David Simon…
Haaretz is no better than the New Yorl Times. It is anti-Israeli agitprop from hard leftists. The Times I understand since they are 5,000 miles away. For the people who write for Haaretz it seems suicidal to take the side of the jihadists against your own people in the midst of an existential war.
I wonder whether Haaretz writers for their English language edition even live in Israel. It seems to me quite possible that they don’t.
Thank you for this grounded view of reality.
Haaretz may as well be the (un)official voice of the Hate-Israel left.
Good balance. Thanks
Great work, Andrew... that Haaretz article was very disturbing, and it's been making lots of waves, so it's a relief to see some well-reasoned pushback. Thank you! And many thanks to your IDF sources too :)
The Haaretz article will find it’s intended audience, unfortunately.
Its intended audience is foreign leftists. Israelis barely read Haaretz since it took a hard left turn to appeal to non-Israeli antizionists.
It's audience consists of a couple of thousand hard core leftists.
And journalists from The Guardian, the BBC and other news outlets that consider Haaretz the "go-to".
Israeli society is in the midst of a hearty debate about the war, their internal society, and everything else under the sun. Your article, Andrew, is an excellent piece dispassionately examining the situation in a nuanced way. But who cares about nuance now? Everyhting has become so binary. The only way to overpower a hateful shouter is to shout louder. But that just invites and even louder retaliation. As so we eacalate the shouting, and any critical reasoning is lost in the noise.
Good clear balanced article. Had no real knowledge of Haaretz, certainly do now, difficult to comprehend their anti Israeli hard left stance, must be for those outside Israel surely?
Perhaps somewhat resembling the Third Reich?
As I read the Haaretz article, it appeared as borderline fifth column reporting. I am curious how Haaretz, as an indigenous news outlet, is supporting Israeli sovereignty.
After months of reading your reporting, Andrew, and comparing with my own military experience, your reporting is definitely honest and trustworthy. And so it is with this post.
Thank you for your diligence extra effort you take to provide us with balanced and honest perspectives during Israel's continued wars against the Islamists.
'But, as today’s revelations about the British SAS show, this is not solely an IDF phenomenon. As I have written before, armies recruit from societies. Societies contain both good and bad people.'
Thought this a timely reminder too.
I don't understand how Israelis write and publish such unashamedly biased pieces against the very IDF that protects their own lives. As you say, there are bad apples in the IDF but to imply that they characterize the IDF as a whole is unfathomable. Why does Haaretz do it? For a political agenda isn't enough -- I don't understand.
I kind of get the positions of the international left (the three greatest sources of evil in the world are the US, Israel, and Saudi Arabia, in that order). I don't get Haaretz. But anyway, that's not the point I want to make. The point is, Israel, a democracy, has Haaretz. A disputatious dissident pain-in-the-ass publication is legal. I doubt there's anything comparable in a Muslim-led nation.
An excellent rebuttal. Very thoughtful and precise like a calm, layered meditation on military ethics, institutional behaviour, and journalistic responsibility. Your testimonial forms bridges between raw experience with analytical critique. It was touching how you orchestrate the voices of the soldiers against Haaretz’s portrayal - after all lets not forget these men are risking their lives here.
The recurring assertion that “not a word of hatred” was surprising In a setting marked by personal trauma and existential threat, one might expect hatred to surface, even subliminally. Its absence raises questions: is this emotional restraint a product of institutional messaging, psychological numbing, or ideological performance?
This is frustrating stuff. As someone 5000 miles away who just wants to know the facts so I can make an informed judgment of my own, I have Andrew Fox's word against the NYTimes, the Guardian... While I have come to believe that the NYTimes and Guardian have uncritically accepted and reported Hamas-influenced propaganda, that's still different from knowingly printing false eyewitness reports, which is Andrew's allegation here about Haaretz. Even though I want to believe Andrew's version, I can't simply dismiss the other reporting because it says things that I don't like to hear.
How can this be resolved? Is the NYTimes given the same access as Andrew was given?
That’s not my allegation at all. My allegation is that they’ve made no attempt to tell the other side of the story, no attempt to present a rounded picture, and have produced an unbalanced and manipulative hatchet job. Not that they haven’t published lies before (see Apaches on 7 October).
Spot on
Hey just to chip in here. My reading was just that Andrew had his own experience with IDF troops in Gaza. He doesn’t say that the Haaretz sources are lying.
You have to decide how you’ll allow information to enter into your personal processing system. For example, Benny Morris - Israeli historian - doesn’t use oral testimony as a matter of methodology. Ask any cop, eye witness accounts are fundamentally flawed. Basically you can’t trust them. Read Homicide: A Year on the Killing Streets by David Simon…
The alternative is harder, radical empiricism.