Six weeks after its article vilified the Israeli government with false claims that it had forced Palestinian mothers who received authorization to leave Gaza for humanitarian reasons with their babies to return to Gaza to reapply after their permits expired, the Washington Post finally issued a correction, but still managed to find a way to malign the Israeli government by introducing new unnamed sources with new unverified claims.
The Post’s “editor’s note” affixed to the original article, which had been titled, “Israel’s war with Hamas separates Palestinian babies from their mothers,” stated:
An earlier version of this article about Palestinian mothers in #Gaza who have been separated from their newborns mischaracterized some aspects of Israeli rules for permits that allowed some Palestinian women, before Oct. 7, to travel from Gaza to give birth at hospitals in the West Bank and Israel. The article incorrectly said that all Palestinian mothers who received authorization to leave Gaza for humanitarian reasons had to return to Gaza to reapply after their permits expired. In fact, it was not always necessary for mothers to return to Gaza.
The article has been updated to specify that it was hospital officials who told two Palestinian mothers that they needed to return to Gaza to apply for new permits. The article also reported an incorrect birth weight for one newborn, Mahmoud; he weighed 3½ pounds, not 7 pounds. The article has been corrected.
“In addition, The Post neglected to seek comment from Israeli officials for this article,” the Post admitted.
Yet, as Robert Satloff, the Executive Director of The Washington Institute, pointed out, “The Post is holding firm on refusing to identify the hospitals or name any of the nurses, doctors or administrators cited makes little sense. Instead, the Post is doubling down on the unverified claim that the unnamed interviewees have a legitimate fear of ‘retaliation’ by Israel.”
Satloff noted that on December 6, NBC News cited the hospital and a doctor by name in its own version of this story on Dec 6. He added that the Post added the following paragraph to the original story in which they used unnamed sources making new unverified claims:
But patient advocates and hospital staff who help women with the process say these on-the-ground extensions can be difficult to obtain and are not consistently granted. One of the mothers in this story said she was not aware that she could apply for an extension, and left without doing so.
Success! Well, at least partial success.
Late this afternoon, @washingtonpost finally published an “editor’s note” & an updated version of the flawed Nov 17 article on #Palestinian mothers separated from their newborn infants because of the #Israel–#Hamas war.…
— Robert Satloff (@robsatloff) December 29, 2023