Skip to content
  • Image
  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Youtube
  • Podcasts
  • Email
  • Subscribe to Ray’s Columns
  • Contact
The Arab Daily News

The Arab Daily News

Original news, features, opinions from Chicago to Jerusalem

  • About
    • About
    • Our Writers
    • Subscribe to Ray’s Columns
    • Book Store
    • Contact
    • Submit Book Reviews, Press Releases
    • Advertise
    • Privacy Corrections Policy
    • Profile on Ray Hanania
    • Submit Press Release
  • Features
    • Food
    • Book Review
    • Humor
    • Movies
    • Travel
  • Arab Stores Targeted
  • Arab Community Network Page
    • Arab Community Network Page
    • Arab Heritage America resources
    • Directory
      • Groups & Organizations
      • Mosques, Churches
      • Restaurants
      • 2008 & 2014 Arab Media Directories
    • National Arab Heritage Month
    • Video: Chicago Arab History
    • Video: Photo Array of Chicago Arabs
    • Overview of Arabs in America
    • Hanania standup comedy
    • Arabs on the Titanic
    • Obituaries
  • Podcasts
    • Ray Hanania on Politics Podcast
    • Arab News Ray Hanania Radio
    • Arab Radio Podcast intro
    • Radio Baladi Detroit
  • Hanania on Tiktok
  • Subscribe to Ray’s Columns
  • Toggle search form
  • Al-Haq
    War crimes probe urged against two Israeli snipers who intentionally killed civilian women, children Christian & Muslim
  • CAIR Executive Director and co-founder Nihad Awad
    CAIR Says Israel Turns Gaza into ‘Human Slaughterhouse’ as Killing of Civilians Continues Arab World
  • photo credit author Nehemia Gershuni-Aylho www.NGPhoto.biz and Wikipedia
    Emergency Court Motions to Stop Elbit Drone Parts Shipment via Frankfurt Airport  Activism
  • American Journalist Shireen Abu Akleh murdered by Israeli soldiers May 11, 2022
    Documentary names soldier it says killed Shireen Abu Akleh in 2022 American Arabs
  • Committee to Protect Journalists, CPJ
    Jordan bans 12 news sites for ‘spreading media poison’ following corruption report Arab World
  • CAIR Logo. Council on American Islamic Relations
    CAIR Condemns MIT for banning Class President from Graduation Ceremony over Anti-Genocide speech Activism
  • ADC creates emergency fund to defend people who are being punished for expressing views on the American-sanction violence by Israel in the Gaza Strip. Photo courtesy of ADC
    ADC Condemns ADL, Rep. Torres’ Defamation of Dr. Lara Sheehi Activism
  • UN Special Committee on Israeli practices in occupied territories warns of a second Nakba  Arab World
  • Arab American community liaison Hassan Nijem, Cook County Treasurer Maria Pappas and Bolingbrook Mayor Mary Basta at the Arab American Heritage Month event hosted by Pappas’s office.
    Pappas honors Arab American business and community leaders for Heritage Month Activism
  • 04-28-25 Pappas Arab Heritage Month
    Cook County Treasurer Maria Pappas recognizes Arab American Heritage Month by honoring business and community leaders American Arabs
  • Stuffed Grape Leaves. Photo courtesy of Ray Hanania
    A recipe on how to make Stuffed Grape Leaves with lamb, ox tail and rice American Arabs
  • Andrew Boutros, interim US Attorney Northern District of Illinois. Photo courtesy of the US Attorney's Office
    Andrew S. Boutros Takes Oath of Office as United States Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois American Arabs
  • Israeli massacres of Palestinian civilians March 18 2025
    Palestinians demand investigation of Israeli war crimes in Gaza Strip Arab World
  • Illinois Muslim Action Day April 9 2025
    Illinois Muslim Action Day Policies at April 9 Statehouse News Conference American Arabs
  • Investigation demanded in March 23 massacre of 15 first responders by Israel's military in Rafah
    Investigation demanded into Israel slaughter of First Responder in Rafah on March 23, 2025 Arab World

Jerusalem Post columnist twists the facts

Posted on October 14, 2015January 25, 2016 By rayhanania 1 Comment on Jerusalem Post columnist twists the facts
SHARE ...
          
 
  

  • Tweet

Lahav Harkov, the Knesset reporter for the Jerusalem Post, took to Twitter to publish lies in response to my criticism of her opinion column, published in the New York Post.

By Ray Hanania

Ray Hanania covering Chicago City Hall (1976-1992)
Ray Hanania
covering Chicago
City Hall
(1976-1992)

I have been attacked by a lot of fanatics on both sides of the fence. Arab extremists and Israeli extremists, and rightwing American fanatics, too. They all have one thing in common, they hate.

So when I read a column recently by Lahav Harkov, the Jerusalem Post’s Knesset correspondent, I cited it in my Creators Syndicate column as an example of the viciousness by Israelis who work with American newspapers with a history anti-Arab racism to twist the facts and deceive their readers by presenting an unjournalistic imbalance of facts.

Click here for my Creators Syndicate column.

My column focused on the wildly imbalanced coverage of the escalating violence between Israelis and Palestinians. The mainstream American news media is focused mainly on violence by Palestinians against Israelis — many ugly and vicious attacks that are unjustified for sure. But the same media, including Harkov and the New York Post, ignore the equally vicious attacks and violence by Israeli soldiers, the armed Israelis settlers and extremist Israelis against Palestinian civilians.

I wrote:

Most never print Palestinian victim names. Front Page Magazine complains that the mainstream news media is not blaming Palestinians enough for the terrorism. Only The Houston Chronicle and The New York Times mention the victim by name, in passing, as a part of a story on the rising violence.

Neither does a particularly vicious op-ed in the notoriously anti-Arab newspaper, the New York Post, written by the Jerusalem Post’s Senior Knesset Correspondent Lahav Harkov.

It’s another example of how the Israeli and mainstream American news media partner up. It’s not enough to write with bias in the Israeli press, as Harkov does. The New York Post gives him a platform to twist facts in America, too.

Very little detail is published about the killing of Palestinians, like Noor Hassan. She was 5 months pregnant and her daughter was killed with her. Several of her children were injured when Israel bombed her home.

The Israelis have make a big case that knife-wielding Palestinians are the danger, and the media has bought it. But firing a missile at a pregnant woman in her home might be worse. It’s something the media excuses, because the missile was fired by Israel.

This is how the American news media stokes the flames of violence. Israelis are accepting of the violence, as Harkov explains, calling it “daily life.” But that’s only because the media has sided with them and they downplay or ignore Israeli terrorism against Palestinians.

The attacks are gruesome on both sides.

Harkov wrote in the anti-Arab New York Post column:

“As I write, in addition to the countless rock-throwing and firebombing incidents in the West Bank, this week there have been 13 stabbing or shooting attacks, with four killed and dozens injured — though today there seems to be a new attack every hour.

“At the same time, Israelis are nothing if not defiant. I’ll be damned if a bunch of anti-Semites keep me from going to work, or to pray at the Western Wall, or to the movies or anywhere else. Allowing my life to be seriously disrupted would be, as the cliché goes, letting the terrorists win.”

 

Headline on Harkov's column int he anti-Arab New York Post
Headline on Harkov’s column int he anti-Arab New York Post

Click here for Harkov’s column in the New York Post.

Of course, Harkov ignored all of the incidents of Israeli attacks against and killings of Palestinian civilians. There is a long list of them, some of which I published in the Creators Syndicate column.

And on Twitter, she lies in her writings:

Ex-JPost columnist @rayhanania says its “particularly vicious” 4 Israelis 2 not want 2b stabbed in hit piece on this http://nypost.com/2015/10/08/in-israel-were-defying-terror-by-living-our-lives/ …

Lahav Harkov on Twitter 10-14-15
Lahav Harkov on Twitter 10-14-15

Not even Close Lahav. I did not write that your column is “particularly vicious” for Israelis to not want to be stabbed as you falsely claim and twist in typical hateful style. I wrote that your column was particularly vicious, because you intentionally closed your eyes and never mentioned the violence by Israelis against Palestinian civilians. You pretend that the violence is just by Palestinians against Israelis, and that’s just not true. It’s a lie.

Lahav’s column also represented the close, cozy relationship between the Israeli news media and the mainstream American newspaper, how easy it for an Israeli to distort facts not just in an Israeli newspaper but also in an American newspaper, granted this one notorious for its anti-Arab hatred.

In fact, I am against ALL of the violence on both sides. But Lahav’s writing clearly shows support for ignoring Israeli violence against Palestinian civilians. She completely fails to acknowledge it, which was the real point of my column criticizing her. And that is not just “particularly vicious” but it must be pure hate. It’s clearly not journalism. Maybe it was a “hit piece,” but only because it hit the nail on the head.

Harkov later challenges my existence, claiming I am not a real Palestinian because I was born in the United States of a Palestinian father and mother (whose homes and lands were taken by Israel’s government — my dad’s family was chased out of Jerusalem, where Harkov immigrated to after leaving New Jersey.)

Harkov represents a dark side of Israel. There are a lot of good Israelis who recognize that the violence is the result of extremist haters and killers who exist on both sides, Palestinian and Israeli. But, like many Israelis who are extremist, Harkov can’t get herself to recognize and acknowledge the truth that many Israelis are just as bad or even worse than the Palestinians she demonizes as “terrorists” and anti-Semites.

She has to lie. And she attacks me not by addressing the facts of what I wrote, but rather by distorting my views and then attacking the distorted views to make herself look like she is the victim of my column, which she calls a “hit piece.” It shows how she is not even near a real journalist at all.

Harkov receives a handful of pats on her back from other fanatics on her Twitter list who believe her twisted lies, but that’s all a part of the deception of extremists and haters. That’s how they justify their hate. They never see their own victims as human beings, just animals. They demonize in order to justify the violence that their side commits and it allows them to pretend it never happens.

Lahav represents the growing trend of Israelis turning to hatred and justifying of violence against civilians who are non-Jews. Israeli soldiers and settlers can attack and kill Palestinian civilians without ever having to worry about Lahav Harkov writing criticism of their war crimes.

And that’s her shame, not mine.

newswire info
  • About
  • Latest Posts
rayhanania
rayhanania
Op-Ed writer, author, radio host, podcaster at The Arab Daily News
Ray Hanania is an award-winning columnist, author & former Chicago City Hall reporter (1977-1992). A veteran who served during the Vietnam War and the recipient of four SPJ Peter Lisagor Awards for column writing, Hanania writes weekly opinion columns on mainstream American & Chicagoland topics for the Southwest News-Herald, Des Plaines Valley News, the Regional News, The Reporter Newspapers, and Suburban Chicagoland.  

His award winning columns can be found at www.HANANIA.COM Subscribe FREE today

Hanania also writes about Middle East issues for the Arab News, and The Arab Daily News criticizing government policies in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Hanania was named "Best Ethnic American Columnist" by the New America Media in November 2007, and is the 2009 recipient of the SPJ National Sigma Delta Chi Award for column writing.

Email Ray Hanania at rghanania@gmail.com.

Follow RayHanania at Twitter
rayhanania
Latest posts by rayhanania (see all)
  • Israelisnipers shooting and killing hospital workers in Gaza - December 11, 2023
  • CAIR Condemns Israeli Executions of Wounded, Unarmed Palestinian in West Bank   - December 11, 2023
  • Arab and Muslim American voters face a “simple choice” between Biden’s inhumanity and Trump’s edgy politics - December 9, 2023

  • Tweet

SHARE ...
          
 
  
 
          
 
 Tweet 
Arab World, Bloggers, Commentary, Israel, News Media, Palestine & Jordan, Ray Hanania Tags:bias, Israel, Israelis, killing of civilians, Lahav Harkov, New York Post, news media bias, Palestine, Palestinians, violence

Post navigation

Previous Post: No discussion of Israel or Palestine at Democratic debate
Next Post: Israeli journalists, IDF twist facts on social media videos

Related Posts

  • ArabCon 2024 Gala Program features Dr. Cornel West, Macklemore, and more American Arabs
  • Earth Day, Science Marches and Earth Day Church American Arabs
  • Retailers pull racist anti-Arab costumes for Halloween American Arabs
  • UAE names 83 terrorist groups including two from US American Arabs
  • Future of Middle East: Between a rock and a hard place Arab World
  • Algeria protestors. Photo courtesy of Abdennour Toumi
    Algeria: The People Are Missing Abdennour Toumi

More Related Articles

Turkish government comes to aid of Palestinians Arab World Politics
Jordans King Abdullah II at UN Sept. 25, 2018. Photo courtesy of the United Nations Jordan’s King rejects Trump’s actions at United Nation speech Arab World
Podcast: Who’s Who in Iraq, Syria conflicts Ali Younes
Night shot of the Israeli supreme court building in Jerusalem which provides two sets of justice, one for Jews and one for non-Jews inside Israel. (Photo credit: Wikipedia) Israel strips Palestinian of “Israeli citizenship” Arab World
Iranian city, Photo courtesy of WIkipedia Confronting Iran cornerstone to confronting extremism Arab World
Musician Bashar Murard and his band at the Taybeh OktoberFest Taybeh OktoberFest to rock the West Bank this weekend Arab World

Comment (1) on “Jerusalem Post columnist twists the facts”

  1. Zak says:
    October 17, 2015 at 9:32 am

    It doesn’t take much searching to find that Ray is absolutely right, our media is totally biased and doesn’t tell the whole story.

    Log in to Reply

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

You must be logged in to post a comment.

Ray Hanania's 4 times a week columns at https://RayHanania.com at Substack

Enter Your Email to Subscribe to Ray Hanania’s Columns

  • OPINION COLUMNS
  • Photo courtesy of Journalist Abdennour Toumi
    France: Political Compromise vs Political Instability
    August 28, 2024
  • Zakia Restaurant in Atlanta, Georgia
    Arabs eat Middle East food like they are making love
    June 27, 2024
  • Zwar lamb kabob and kufta with white and yellow rice
    Zwar ranked the Best Middle East restaurant in Chicagoland suburbs
    June 8, 2024
  • Pictured: Rahm Emanuel, Afghan activist Salman Aftab who was co-chair of the Iftar dinner, and several non-Arab Muslim leaders. Also pictured is Ald. Joe Moore. Photo courtesy of Ray Hanania for Arab News
    Comprehensive look at the failings of former Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel
    January 18, 2024
  • NEWSWIRE
  • CAIR Logo. Council on American Islamic Relations
    CAIR Condemns MIT for banning Class President from Graduation Ceremony over Anti-Genocide speech
    June 1, 2025
  • Arab American community liaison Hassan Nijem, Cook County Treasurer Maria Pappas and Bolingbrook Mayor Mary Basta at the Arab American Heritage Month event hosted by Pappas’s office.
    Pappas honors Arab American business and community leaders for Heritage Month
    April 29, 2025
  • 04-28-25 Pappas Arab Heritage Month
    Cook County Treasurer Maria Pappas recognizes Arab American Heritage Month by honoring business and community leaders
    April 27, 2025
  • Mike Ghouse
    Celebration of 500th Interfaith Marriage Ceremony
    February 14, 2025

Creative Commons License
All work on this website is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. Do not edit original work. Give credit to the original source.

  • NEWS
  • Al-Haq
    War crimes probe urged against two Israeli snipers who intentionally killed civilian women, children
    July 2, 2025
  • CAIR Executive Director and co-founder Nihad Awad
    CAIR Says Israel Turns Gaza into ‘Human Slaughterhouse’ as Killing of Civilians Continues
    July 1, 2025
  • BOOK REVIEWS
  • Faisal Abbas Book Anecdotes
    Book Review: Arab author shares his anecdotes living in the United Kingdom
    October 22, 2024
  • Columnist Ray Hanania at the ADC Convention in Dearborn with the author Susan Abulhawa
    Book Review: Mornings in Jenin bySusan Abulhawa
    September 14, 2024
  • ENTERTAINMENT
  • Television set and remote. Photo by Glenn Carstens-Peters on Unsplash
    MBC GROUP unveils MBCNOW, its brand-new groundbreaking entertainment service aggregator
    February 24, 2025
  • ArabCon 2024 Gala Program features Dr. Cornel West, Macklemore, and more
    September 6, 2024
  • New-iTunes-1400-x-1400-The-Ray-Hanania-Show-Podcast-Icon-300-x-300.jpg
  • powerpr300x300ad.jpg
  • The-Kings-Pawn-Book-300-x-300.png
  • terroristbookcover-300-x-300.jpg
  • Podcast-iTunes-Logo-Chi-City-Hall-1985.jpg
Arab News Newspaper Logo
Read the Arab News, the leading English language newspaper in the MIddle East

Follow Ray Hanania at
Twitter
Facebook
TitkTok
BlueSky
RayHanania Columns

Click here to get information on The Ray Hanania Radio Show and its podcasts

Copyright © 2025 The Arab Daily News.

Powered by PressBook Premium theme