Media watchdog groups are getting physical with outlets they believe are covering the Middle East incompletely or inaccurately. The Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America (CAMERA) – a Boston-based pro-Israel group that monitors outlets across North America, Europe, and Asia – recently evaluated the degree to which the New York Times was covering the rhetoric of Hamas publications and statements regarding Israel.

The results, per a release sent out by the group, were sub-par:

“Harvest the skulls of the Jews!” That was the exhortation of a Hamas spokesman broadcast on Palestinian television – but The New York Times never reported it. Genocidal incitement against Israel is almost totally ignored by the publication. CAMERA has long deplored the failure of The Times to cover such calls for genocide against the Jews by Hamas and other Palestinian groups. Only very rarely is the pervasive propaganda reported and then almost always it’s couched in qualifying language dismissive of its deep influence on the attitudes of the Palestinian people.

As part of an awareness-raising campaign, CAMERA recently purchased a series of ads – with pieces appearing last Friday in the New York Metro and earlier this week in the New York Post and AM New York – calling out the Times.

A recent spike in West Bank terrorism has triggered renewed debates over the degree to which Palestinian leaders are implicated in anti-Israel and anti-Jewish incitement. Celebrations of terrorism have again become mainstays of Hamas discourse, as have euphemistic calls for “resistance” from Fatah leaders. The resulting environment has been directly linked not just to general instability but more specifically to deadly violence.

The CAMERA ad: