A photographer whose work is routinely picked up by international agencies reportedly stages photographs of hunger in Gaza, emphasizing women and children and avoiding showing Palestinians receiving food, German Bild says.
The investigative article (translated via Google) reported (emphasis removed):
The hunger is (almost always) real – but the images are often not quite so. A recently widely circulated photo showed desperate people on a truck in front of a food distribution point. Opposite them: photographer Anas Zayed Fteiha, a freelance “journalist” commissioned by the Turkish news agency Anadolu.
Potential problem: The scene, captured by other photographers as well, shows mostly adult men waiting for food – and getting it.
…
Because “journalist” Fteiha apparently has a mission: “Free Palestine.” This is what it says on a bombastic painting he presents on his Instagram account—in combat gear with the proud inscription “Presse.” The “artist” who created the image for Fteiha is an avowed Jew-hater.
…
In the Gaza Strip, almost exclusively Palestinian photographers are now taking photographs – quite a few with Hamas connections. Historian and photography expert Gerhard Paul told the Süddeutsche Zeitung: “In southern Gaza, Hamas controls 100 percent of image production.” The goal: to generate sympathy in the West and stir up anger against Israel.
The Israeli foreign ministry shared the article, noting that Hamas uses staged photographs, transmitted by anti-Israel freelancers and news agencies, “to manipulate global opinion.”
Journalist Avi Mayer noted that while photos of “starving” Palestinian children who turned out to have other maladies were published on front pages throughout the world, only four newspapers, aside from the New York Post, initially did the same with photos of Israeli hostages being starved deliberately by Hamas — and they were all Israeli outlets.
Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). He is the author of Trump 2.0: The Most Dramatic ‘First 100 Days’ in Presidential History, available for Amazon Kindle. He is also the author of The Trumpian Virtues: The Lessons and Legacy of Donald Trump’s Presidency, now available on Audible. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.
