At least eight of the children pictured in the widely condemned front-page New York Times feature last week were killed by rockets fired by Gazan terror groups, the Meir Amit Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center (ITIC) reported. The poorly researched article blamed the deaths of Gazan children “who only wanted to grow up to be doctors, artists and leaders,” on Israel.

Furthermore, another two of the “innocent children” were Muhammad Sabar Ibrahim Suleiman, 17, a full-fledged Hamas terrorist, who was killed along with his father, a Hamas commander, and Khaled-al Qanou, another terrorist, listed in the NYT as being 17, was actually a 20-year-old terrorist.

The feature, entitled They Were Only Children, did not bother mentioning the well-known fact that terror groups in Gaza regularly recruit minors, a violation of international law.

An image ridiculing the NYT feature is circulating online, entitled Hamas Wanted For The Murder Of 67 Children. The image, which also changed the name of the paper to The New Woke Times also features pictures of Hamas leaders under the title: The Leaders Of The International Community Calling To Investigate Hamas For The Murder Of 67 Children.”

“Hamas’ goal of generating civilian casualties is achieved,” said Rabbi Abraham Cooper, the Associate Dean, Director, Global Social Action of the Simon Wiesenthal Center. “New York Times editors give Hamas ultimate victory labeling these deaths as a crime against humanity by Israel instead of naming these mass murderers. If international media and donor nations continue their irresponsible policies, then more ‘innocents’ will surely die in next round and terrorists around the world will see that terrorism does pay.”

“The publication by The New York Times of the photograph of the children is a libelous distortion and misrepresentation of the facts of the recent conflict,” said Malcolm Hoenlein, executive vice chairman of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations. “It was Hamas that initiated the conflict and placed its rockets among civilian populations and proceeded to launch more than 4000 rockets at Israel, even though around 700 of them landed within their own territory and may have been physically responsible for many of the deaths. The world should join in condemning them and seeking their arrest for those war crimes.”

(YWN Israel Desk – Jerusalem)