Fifty Global Research Group

Our research has been published in the inaugural issue of the peer-reviewed journal The Digital Hate Review. We analysed 1,378 articles published between February and May 2024 by eight major news outlets: The Guardian, The New York Times, BBC, CNN, The Washington Post, Reuters, Associated Press, and the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. The study examines a gap in journalistic standards in reporting on military conflict, specifically, the reporting of casualty figures in Gaza. During the most heavily covered war in Gaza’s history, we found a striking asymmetry in the use of sources. Both principal sources offered incomplete information: • Gaza’s Hamas-run Ministry of Health reported total deaths, without distinguishing between civilians and combatants. • Israel reported figures for killed combatants. Comparing these two sets of data is essential for assessing one of the central questions of the war: the proportion of civilian and combatant casualties. Yet Israeli figures appeared in only 3% of the articles we analysed. This systematic omission led to removing Hamas combatants from the public picture and reinforced a narrative in which Israel is fighting Gaza’s civilian population alone. News outlets also increasingly failed to identify primary sources. The Guardian was the clear outlier: in 43% of the articles in which it cited casualty figures from Gaza’s Hamas-run Ministry of Health, it did not identify the source at all. While the UN sources put disclaimers saying that the data from Gaza still hasn’t been independently verified, this disclaimer is almost absent in the media. Instead, the figures were presented as self-evident or generally known information. This was the highest rate among all the outlets we analysed. This imbalance also matters beyond the media. International institutions often treat press reporting as an epistemic authority. For example, when citing the number of killed militants, the UN commission referred to a Guardian article rather than to IDF data. The Guardian article relied on a database of individually named militants, a figure nearly twice lower than the IDF’s reported total number of killed militants. Our article examines how these reporting choices can shape an “authoritative version of reality”, and why standards of sourcing, attribution, and context are so important in conflict reporting. The full article is available: digitalhatereview.com/articl…

Pew Research Center is one of the most trusted independent research centers. It is a nonpartisan think tank that conducts high-quality research. It’s unlikely that much has changed in the six years since the report was published.

Why do people believe headlines without checking? Psychology explains: - authority bias (if it sounds official, we trust it); - halo effect (big names make everything look true) - the illusory truth effect (repetition feels like proof).

The Guardian’s headline is misleading. It ignores tens of thousands of Hamas militants whose identities were never verified, according to @IDF. @ncri_io found that 75% of people don’t read articles they just repost headlines. That’s how false narratives spread like wildfire. And in nearly half of its Gaza coverage, The Guardian cited Hamas figures without mentioning the source at all. That’s not journalism. This is propaganda.

"The systematic omission of the fact that Hamas militants were among the dead has lead to distorted media narrative, portraying Israel as waging war not against the terrorist organization Hamas but against innocent civilians". Our new article with @Mr_Andrew_Fox has been published in the spring issue of The Middle East Quarterly. It provides an in-depth analysis of Tunnel Vision and The Authoritarian Version of Reality - narratives created by leading global media. These outlets must return to professional journalistic standards and be held accountable for their role in the information war. The outlets: @CNN @BBC @nytimes @TheWashingtonPo @Reuters @AP @guardian @ABCaustralia. Read full article: meforum.org/meq/misinformati…

"Journalists are still taking Hamas-supplied casualty figures at face value". Join us today at 8PM IST, we will present our reports with @Mr_Andrew_Fox for @CAMERAorg. us06web.zoom.us/j/8651687943…

"On December 13, the start-up Fifty Global Research Group, publishing through the UK-based Henry Jackson Society, released bombshell findings showing that over a four-month period, 85% of analyzed publications failed to distinguish between combatant and civilian deaths. Almost all sources (98%) quoted figures from the Hamas-affiliated Gaza Health Ministry, which doesn’t differentiate between combatants and civilians, while only 4% used Israeli figures. Additionally, nearly 20% of sources cited Hamas figures without attribution, suggesting that the information was public knowledge and undisputed". A detailed article by @Jerusalem_Post covering our research was recently published. It includes an interview with me and interview and comments from @EylonALevy. I highlighted the issue of a “major crisis in journalism,” focusing on ethical failures in mainstream media, especially in reporting on military conflicts. The study reveals how editorial politics shape biases, reducing prominent outlets to the level of amateur bloggers. Eylon Levy pointed to a deeper systemic issue: not only journalists but even many of Israel’s allies lack proper access to Israeli casualty data. He stated, “We’re not fighting an information war. There’s a coordinated campaign against us by UNRWA and other agencies, constantly giving interviews blaming Israel, while we fail to respond effectively.” The full article here: jpost.com/israel-news/articl…

Here is yet another example of how all casualties of the conflict are labeled as "civilians" in an article by @ishaantharoor, which criticizes our research. (The WP specified the number of militants among the total casualties in the Gaza war in only 5% of all the cases).