Jake Wallis Simons, a columnist for the Daily Telegraph, wrote, “Hamas may have killed more Palestinians since the ceasefire than Israel has in the whole war.”
He did not just include this statement in the subheadline of his October 18 article. He also offered no evidence to back it up anywhere in the piece. Nor could we find any publicly available data supporting such a claim.
According to Gaza’s Health Ministry, Israeli attacks have killed at least 68,229 people, including 20,179 children. The Lancet medical journal estimates the true death toll could be closer to 186,000, while UN Rapporteur Francesca Albanese has suggested it may be as high as 680,000.
The idea that Hamas has killed anywhere near that number since the ceasefire is completely unsupported by evidence. Unsurprisingly, the claim sparked major backlash online.
Since then, the Telegraph quietly updated its subheadline to read: “Hamas may have murdered more Palestinians since the ceasefire than they killed Israeli soldiers in the whole war.”
But the question remains. Was this change made out of journalistic integrity, or because of the public outrage that followed?
