Global News and Postmedia Refuse to Correct Oct. 7 Falsehoods

This article was originally published by The Grind and appears here with permission.

In the aftermath of the Hamas-led attacks on Oct. 7, 2023, the false claim that beheaded babies had been found spread like wildfire in worldwide media and on social media. 

It was widely used, alongside credible information about the attacks, to justify Israel’s punishing response and shut down criticism. 

The rumour of beheaded babies first made international news on Oct. 10 when a reporter for Israel’s i24NEWS, Nicole Zedeck, said on air that an Israeli commander told her there were “40 dead babies” in Kibbutz Kfar Aza. That morning, i24NEWS published an article by Zedeck writing that “soldiers say they found babies with their heads cut off.” 

The Israeli government’s official X.com (Twitter) account shared Zedeck’s i24NEWS video report that day, with the caption “40 babies murdered.”

But we no know that in Kfar Aza that day, no babies were killed. The youngest death recorded by Israeli authorities in that kibbutz was a 14-year-old. One baby, defined as younger than 12 months, was killed in southern Israel during the Oct 7. attacks, in Kibbutz Be’eri, according to Israeli government data.

The day the beheaded babies rumour went viral, Oct. 10, U.S. President Joe Biden told the media that, “There are moments in this life when pure, unadulterated evil is unleashed on the world.” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also called Hamas “evil” and soon after the group was described as “demonic” by Canadian Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre.

In Canada, the Postmedia chain of papers published an article on Oct. 10  with the headline “Hamas terrorists murdered as many as 40 babies in village attack: IDF [Israeli Defence Forces] soldiers,” with the subheading reading that soldiers found “babies with their heads cut off” in Kfar Aza. The article, which appeared in the flagship National Post and local papers such as the Ottawa Citizen andVancouver Sun, was a republication from the Jewish Syndicate News (or Jewish News Syndicate), based on Zedeck’s i24NEWS report. In Toronto, Postmedia owns and operates the Toronto Sun.

Pundits and journalists in Canada also repeated the claim that day. Globe and Mail columnist Robyn Urback, for example, quote-tweeted the i24NEWS video on X.com, commenting, “They beheaded Jewish babies. Tell me again how this is about ‘resistance.’” The post, which remains up, has been viewed around 270,000 times. The Globe and Mail as a publication, however, appears not to have reported this false claims of beheaded babies as fact.

The next day, Oct. 11, U.S. President Joe Biden said: “I never really thought that I would see and have confirmed pictures of terrorists beheading children.” But White House staff quickly clarified that Biden had not seen such photos and was instead referring to media reports.  

Despite the fact that there was no independent confirmation of numerous dead babies, let alone beheaded babies, the story was spreading widely. 

In an Oct. 11 opinion piece in the Toronto Star titled “Barbarism celebrated on Toronto streets,” for example, lawyer and contributor Adam Hummel wrote that “The bodies of 40 murdered babies were discovered at Kibbutz Kfar Aza, many decapitated. Babies. Their decapitation is being celebrated.” 

The next day, on Oct. 12, U.K.-based Sky News published an investigation that found “no Israeli officials have confirmed the claim” of beheaded babies. In the following hours and days, additional reporters and outlets around the world reiterated this finding.

It took over a week for the Star’s editors to remove Hummel’s “beheaded babies” claim, on Oct. 19. And it wasn’t until 10 months later on Aug. 19, 2024, in response to questions from The Grind, that the Star entirely removed the false claims of dead babies in Kfar Aza.

The information debunking the beheaded babies claim was released by the Israeli government, was widely reported by international media, and was confirmed by the only independent investigation on the events of Oct. 7 carried out by an international body. 

That investigation, which Israel did not cooperate with, was titled Detailed findings on attacks carried out on and after 7 October 2023 in Israel and was prepared by the Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, part of the operations of the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHCR). The report as submitted to the UNHCR in June 2024. 

According to the various investigations, it appears that nine-month old Mila Cohen was being held by her mother in the family’s safe room in Be’eri and was killed by gunfire. The gunfire also struck the baby’s mother, who survived, but the baby’s father was killed. The investigations make no finding of a beheading. Elsewhere that day, in Be’er Sheva, a pregnant woman was shot in the stomach and the late-stage fetus she was carrying could not be saved. Two children between the ages of 1-3 (defined as toddlers) were also killed. There is no evidence to suggest they were beheaded.

In total, 40 children were killed during the Oct. 7 attacks, defined as those under 18 years of age. 

In Gaza, Israel’s military campaign has killed over 16,700 Palestinian children, including 710 babies, as of Aug. 31, according to the Palestinian health authority.

[NOTE: This article is focused on print and text media in Canada, and it does not analyze radio and TV coverage, where various false claims also spread.]

Global News’ publishes unsubstantiated and false claims from Israeli colonel about beheaded babies

On Oct. 15, as the claims of beheaded babies in Kfar Aza were proving to be untrue, Global News published an article by their investigative reporter Stewart Bell which included a new claim of beheaded babies, this time in Kibbutz Be’eri. This claim also turned out to be unsubstantiated, but Global News is not correcting its reporting.

Bell is an award-winning journalist who formerly reported for the National Post and is the author of several books about terrorism, with a significant focus on the Middle East. 

His Global News article titled “At Israel kibbutz, Hamas killed elders in street in act of ‘humiliation’”  is based on a visit he made to Kibbutz Be’eri after Oct. 7, including joining a tour for international media, likely on Oct. 14, led by the Israeli military and in particular Colonel Golan Vach.

“Stopping outside one house,” Bell writes in the article, “the colonel said when he arrived to evacuate the occupants, he found a woman and a baby, both dead. The woman had been shot in the back as she tried to protect her child. ‘And the baby was beheaded,’ he said. ‘The stories of beheaded babies are true.’”

On multiple counts, Vach’s claims were untrue. 

Other than Mila Cohen, who died from gunfire, no other babies or infants were killed in Kibbutz Be’eri, and Cohen’s mother survived. There was no instance of a baby and mother both found dead in Be’eri. The next youngest child killed in Be’eri was 12 years old. Aside from Vach’s claim, neither Israeli government sources nor media have corroborated the beheaded claim.

And Vach’s reference to “the stories” of beheaded babies is a clear reference to the rumours from Kfar Aza. While he says those stories are true, they turned out to be false.

Early in his article, Bell writes, o Col. Vach, who showed Global News photos he took on his phone to back up his account, the excess of the Hamas violence was telling.” And at the end of the article, Bell describes Vach again looking at the photos on his phone, photos with Bell writes “documented how his fellow Israelis were killed.”

This conveys to readers that Vach’s photos corroborate his claims, and that Bell would have checked the photos to verify Vach’s account of events, especially regarding the most explosive claims.

But when pressed by a journalist on the Oct. 14 tour of Be’eri, Vach would only say he had seen a beheaded baby, not that he had evidence to provide. The day before, he had told a different group of journalists that he had not taken photos of beheaded babies. 

This absence of evidence is not noted by Bell, and he does not describe what he saw in Vach’s photos. But noting which claims can and cannot be verified with evidence is an essential part of journalism.

While it is theoretically possible that Vach thought he saw or actually saw a baby in that state, it the responsibility of Bell and his editors at Global News to tell readers that this claim could not be verified, that there was no substantiating evidence. As stated in Global News’ Journalistic Principles and Practices, transparency “at the foundation of our newsgathering process.” Later, when more information became available contradicting Vach’s account, it would have been standard practice to include that. But this type of note was not and has not been made.

Bell’s single attempt at presenting another side was noting that “Hamas leaders said Friday [Oct. 13] their fighters had been instructed not to kill women and children but that Gaza civilians had crossed the border and ‘clashed with Israel colonial settlers.’”

Global News’ refuses to correct false and unsubstantiated claim of beheaded babies

Global News was called out for publishing this unsubstantiated claim on Oct. 19, 2023 when editor-in-chief Sonia Verma took part in a live taping of the CBC Ideas radio show at an event in Toronto titled “Trust Talks – The future of journalism in a digital world.” 

During the question and answer segment, an audience member said that all three outlets represented on stage, namely CBC News, Toronto Star and Global News, had repeated the debunked beheaded babies claim in some form thenspecifically quoted Vach’s statement in Bell’s Global News article. The audience member asked Verma and the others about the dangers of publishing unverified claims contained in quotes in articles, and what was being done to stop the spread of disinformation. This question and the answers were included in the broadcasted episode of Ideas on Nov. 8, which was broadcast across the country and around the world.  

VIDEO 1

Question asked to Global News Editor-in-Chief Sonia about the unsubstantiated claim of beheaded babies in Bell’s Oct., 2023, article. At an event in Toronto on Oct. 19, 2023.

Verma responded first, saying in part, “I think what we try to do is to recognize and be transparent about our limits and what we can verify and can’t verify. I need to really see the example that you’re talking about specifically, but every night I go through our scripts and our copy that appear on GN [Global News] to make sure that when we can’t verify something, we try to be transparent about that fact and say ‘Global News has been unable to verify this.’” She adds that if mistakes are made, “we try to address those, to really take a look.”

Global News Editor-in-Chief Sonia Verma’s response at the Oct. 19, 2023, event, emphasizing that the outlet tries to be transparent when they cannot verify claims.

When Bell’s article was published, there was no mention that Global News couldn’t verify Vach’s claim of beheaded babies.

The Grind contacted Bell and Verma in July 2024 about this and asked whether corrections would be made.

Neither Verma nor Bell responded, nor anyone in the news department, where questions of accuracy are handled. Instead, Cathy Paine, a communications specialist at Global News’ parent company Corus Entertainment, replied by email to say: “We stand by our reporting and will not be making any changes at this time.”

Vach’s account as reported by Bell and others, including the New York Times, prolonged and broadened the unsubstantiated claim of beheaded babies while the false claim of the 40 babies at Kfar Aza was being debated and debunked.

The day after Bell’s article was published, Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre called Hamas “a sadistic, demonic, genocidal terrorist death cult.” Poilievre, though, had been using similar language before Bell’s article was published. 

Second significant false claim from Col. Vach in Bell’s Global News article: eight children burned in one house in Be’eri

Bell’s article contains another false claim that remains uncorrected by Global News. 

He describes Vach stopping outside a destroyed house on his media tour. 

“[Vach] said the bodies of two couples with their hands bound were found outside the home. Another 15 bodies were inside. Eight were children, he said. As in other sites attacked by Hamas, the bodies were grouped together and set on fire. ‘They concentrated them, they killed them, and they burned them,’ the colonel said.”  

At other times on this same media tour, Vach claimed the eight children were babies and that he personally evacuated those babies, though Bell did not include that claim.

But, the claim of eight children being burned in that house or any house in Be’eri is false.

The Israeli military later admitted Vach’s statement about eight babies being burned in one house wasn’t true, and the mainstream Israeli media outlet Haaretz reported that, after speaking to leaders of the kibbutz, “to this day there is no known case in any of the surrounding communities where children from several families were murdered together.” While children were killed in or near their own there that day and some houses were burned, there is no record of eight children being killed in any one house, let alone all being burned.

Vach, when pressed about how the house got so destroyed, told international media on the Oct. 14 tour that Israeli tanks shot at it. Bell does not mention this.

In Kibbutz Be’eri, the house which had around that many people held in it as hostages that we know was fired on by Israeli tanks was the home of Pessi Cohen, and this is almost certainly where Vach was speaking to international media that day.

Two children, both 12 years old, were killed at that house, not eight. Their cause of death is not known, and the claim that they were set on fire by Hamas fighters is unsubstantiated.

As reported by other media and the Independent International Commission, Hamas fighters on Oct. 7 gathered around 15 hostages on the property, negotiated with the Israeli military, and exchanged gunfire.

In the afternoon and evening, the Israeli military fired tank shells and a shoulder-launched missile at the house while hostages were inside, according to media reports and the Commission.

The Commission found that Israeli tanks shelled the roof of the house and then retrieved one hostage from the house as it went up in flames. All but two hostages died.

On Oct. 15, the day Bell’s article was published, one of the two surviving hostages, Yasmin Porrat, said on Israeli radio that many were killed in the crossfire, including by IDF fire, and that the IDF had fired tank shells at the “tiny” house.

Israel, in its internal investigation, acknowledges killing at least one of the hostages just outside that house with tank shrapnel. The government’s investigation did not conclude on how the others died. The Independent International Commission report found “at least some were killed by crossfire.” Numerous Hamas fighters were also killed there. Throughout the region, some of their bodies were early on thought to be killed Israelis. (This is part of why the civilian death toll in Israel was initially thought to be higher and then declined.)

Bell’s article makes no mention of the friendly fire or tank shelling.

Mainstream Israeli outlet Ynet noted in Dec. 2023: “Casualties fell as a result of friendly fire on October 7, but the IDF believes that beyond the operational investigations of the events, it would not be morally sound to investigate these incidents due to the immense and complex quantity of them that took place in the kibbutzim and southern Israeli communities due to the challenging situations the soldiers were in at the time.” 

It is now fairly well established, including in a detailed Haaretz investigation in July 2024 and another by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC), that the Israeli military employed the “Hannibal Directive” on Oct. 7. This directive instructs members of the Israeli military to fire on targets to prevent the taking of Israeli hostages, specifically soldiers, even if that means injuring or killing those Israelis. The practice has been used for decades by the IDF and was the subject of a New Yorker feature article in 2014, for example. Both the Haaretz and the ABC articles mention the Cohen house in Be’ri.

The Grind asked Global News about the false claim of eight children being gathered and burned and about why evidence of friendly fire or the Hannibal Directive has been omitted. No corrections were made and Corus Entertainment says it stands by its reporting. 

“Not surprising,” says CJPME

Advocacy group Canadians for Justice and Peace in the Middle East (CJPME) closely follows Canadian media coverage of Israel and Palestine. In a written statement, the organization tells The Grind that in their experience “Global News does not have a robust system in place for resolving journalistic issues, particularly on its website.” While CJPME has gotten some Global News articles corrected, many of their requests have been ignored.

“It is not surprising that, despite efforts, false claims like those about beheaded babies remain online. There is little incentive for a company like Global to correct the record as the truth comes out. Their online articles are not subject to meaningful outside scrutiny, public or private. While individuals may sue for defamation, there isn’t meaningful action to be taken by concerned citizens when Global spreads Israeli propaganda.”

An Maple investigation by Emma Paling found that Global’s talk radio programs have had similar problems. The Alex Pierson Show repeated the “beheaded babies” claim multiple times in Oct. 2023 and has not made corrections or taken the episodes down, Paling reported. 

CJPME also notes that Global News does not have an ombudsman, which CBC does, nor a public editor, as The Toronto Star does, and is not a member of the National NewsMedia Council (NNC), as most major newspapers are.

Postmedia repeated the false claim of 40 killed and beheaded babies in several articles

Canada’s largest newspaper chain, Postmedia, also published false claims about beheaded babies and is not making corrections.

In addition to the Oct. 10, 2023, Postmedia article mentioned earlier claiming 40 babies had been killed and some beheaded, at least three others contain similar false claims. 

An article published on Oct. 13, attributed to “National Post Staff,” titled “These are the graphic photos Israel released of burned babies to reveal horror of Hamas attack,” states that “Hamas terrorists allegedly murdered 40 babies, according to IDF soldiers.” 

An Oct. 30 opinion piece by Avi Benlolo includes a quote from Conservative MP Rachael Thomas saying there are “40 babies who are beheaded.” No mention is made that this claim is unsubstantiated and false.

A National Post article republished from the Jewish News Syndicate on Nov. 2 states that “Hamas terrorists killed more than 100 people in the kibbutz, including 40 babies. They beheaded some of the babies.” While previous reported articles from Postmedia said these were claims from Israeli soldiers, this article treats these false claims as established fact.

(Read more about Postmedia using the Israeli-government-aligned Jewish News Syndicate, from Jeremy Appel writing in The Maple.)

None of the Postmedia articles note this claim was unsubstantiated, and there have been no corrections since. 

These errors were pointed out by The Grind to National Post Editor-in-Chief Rob Roberts and Managing Editor Aileen Donnelly in five emails. Neither editor responded to any of the emails, nor were corrections made. The false claims remain online. 

In a Nov. 6, 2023, article in Postmedia paper the Toronto Sun, columnist Warren Kinsella writes that he viewed the Oct 7. film produced by the Israeli government and shown to select journalist and that, “I saw the decapitated heads of babies and children.” 

When The Grind contacted Kinsella asking if he would correct his article given the information that has come to light, he told us to “go to hell.” No photos or videos of beheaded babies, infants or toddlers (one to three years of age) have been made available to media or investigators for verification.

The National NewsMedia Council, which considers complaints about accuracy in Canadian newspapers, only looks at articles published in the last month, and so all of the Postmedia errors are out of their scope. 

In its 2023 annual report, Postmedia noted it received over $7 million in tax credits — essentially subsidies — from the federal government and $1 million in tax credits from Quebec. The chain has also received over $800,000 in 2024 from the federal government’s Canada Periodical Fund Aid to Publishers grants.

CBC News refuses to add clarification to article containing quote from MP making false claim of 40 babies beheaded

CBC News twice published articles quoting Conservative MP Rachel Thomas making the the false claims of 40 beheaded babies.

In the first instance, on Oct. 17, Senior Reporter John Paul Tasker quotes Thomas saying there were “40 babies who are beheaded” (the same quote the National Post opinion article used). Immediately after Thomas’ claim about the babies, Tasker quotes the MP asking Members of Parliament, “Whose side are you on?” and calling Hamas “sadistic” and “pure evil.” Tasker does not mention the claim is unsubstantiated despite there being many reports published by then indicating the Israeli government could not verify it.

Another article by Tasker a week later, on Oct. 24, quotes MP Thomas making the same false claim but this time notes: “The report of 40 babies being beheaded has not been corroborated.” In this way, CBC News partially corrected its reporting on this claim, more so than Postmedia has. It is questionable though, whether it was necessary to publish the inflammatory and false part of Thomas quote in the first place.

The Grind emailed Tasker to note that the first article still does not mention Thomas’ claim was unsubstantiated and turned out to be false, and we asked if there would be a correction or clarification made. A senior producer diverted The Grind away from the editorial wing of CBC News and instead to CBC’s Head of Public Affairs, Chuck Thompson. Thompson responded on Sept. 24, 2024: “Given the original story appropriately attributed the quote and is journalistically sound, a correction is not necessary.”

Last year, two days after that article was published in Oct. 2023, Brodie Fenlon, who was then editor-in-chief and executive director of programs and standards at CBC News, was on the same panel as Global News’ editor-in-chief Sonia Verma at the Trust Talks event. He received the same question as Verma about publishing unsubstantiated claims of beheaded babies in quotes in articles.

Fenlon talked about reporting on Israel and Gaza and that in a given situation, such as an explosion in Gaza, CBC News “would attribute really carefully and clearly and we’d try to explain and give the context of what we’ve been able to verify ourselves, which is really important.”

But CBC News hasn’t updated Tasker’s article to say it could not verify MP Thomas’ sensational false claim. CBC News readers who saw the follow-up article a week later might have noticed that the claim was unsubstantiated, but those who only saw the first article may still believe it is true.

Fenlon was promoted in January to general manager and editor-in-chief for all of CBC News.

Brodie Fenlon with CBC News responds to the same question that was posed to Global News’ editor-in-chief Sonia Verma at an Oct. 19, 2023, event in Toronto. Fenlon was at the time editor-in-chief and executive director of programs and standards at CBC News, and in January he was promoted to general manager and editor-in-chief for all of CBC News.

(The author has submitted a complaint to the CBC’s Ombudsman about the Oct. 17, 2023, article and The Grind will post an update to this article when the Ombudsman replies to the complaint.)

Global News and Postmedia uncritically repeat Netanyahu’s false claim of “burned babies” 

In another case of questionable journalistic standards, a Global News article by Sean Boynton, with files from Global’s Reggie Cecchini and the Associated Press, ran with the headline “Israel’s Netanyahu shares photos he says are ‘babies murdered and burned’ by Hamas.” This was published on Oct. 12, as the rumours of 40 beheaded babies were swirling around.

Postmedia published a similar article on Oct. 13, mentioned above. 

However, the claims of multiple murdered babies and of burned babies are unsubstantiated, as there was one baby killed on Oct. 7 and no evidence that baby was burned. There is however evidence that other young children were burned.

The Global News article notes that the outlet“has not independently verified the images or other allegations.” But after publishing such a shocking headline, Global News has not followed up to clarify that specific allegations were false. 

Other outlets, such as CTV, published similar articles.

The National Post, Global News and CTV articles all include quotes from Israeli officials pointing to these claims and saying that Hamas is equal to ISIS.

Conservative MP Melissa Lantsman repeated a similar false claim as recently as March 2024 in the House of Commons, saying that Hamas is known for “killing babies in ovens.” Netanayahu continues making a similar false claim, telling the U.S. Congress in July that Hamas “burnt babies alive.” 

Creating a narrative

“The responsibility of media outlets is huge in a story like this,” says Sonya Fatah, associate professor of journalism at Toronto Metropolitan University. 

In the days and weeks after the publication of Bell’s articles and others like them from outlets around the world, Israel was in the process of justifying its bombing of Gaza and then its ground invasion. 

As Israeli Minister of Defence Yoav Gallant framed the narrative on Oct. 9, “We are fighting human animals and we act accordingly.”

Given that their articles were not corrected, Global News and Postmedia readers could easily still believe various false claims about what happened on Oct. 7. just as much as they believe the verified information about the attacks.

Fatah notes that some of these false claims have “the hallmarks of disinformation.”

Disinformation is false information which is meant to mislead, often communicated by government officials. Misinformation is inaccurate information which may be spread without malicious intent.

“Misinformation and disinformation should be a very, very critical concern in every newsroom anywhere in the world,” Fatah explains, noting that media outlets may receive disinformation from government sources, including military officials, and then unwittingly spread it as misinformation. 

“I think a strong editor will be able to see this, will be able to identify it, will be able to take corrective action. And corrective action would include a lot of things. It could include an adjustment in headlines, it could include additional context, it could include a note at the top of the piece including some of the challenges.”

But, Fatah notes, making corrections “doesn’t take away from the fact that you already put the news out there. People who’ve already seen that piece of information have digested it and accept it as fact or truth.” 

You’re not going to get all those people back even if you publish a correction, says Fatah, adding that salacious claims “around beheadings and dead children and babies stick in the imagination even if someone corrects it.”

These claims contribute to the narrative of “the Muslim as being the one to fear, the Muslim as being the terrorist, the Muslim as being barbarians,” says Fatah. This has been happening in a heightened way since the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, Fatah says, and now specifically with Palestinians, who are often referred to in western media interchangeably with Muslims.

The Global News and Postmedia articles, along other media and social media spreading misinformation, contributed to creating a narrative that children and babies were specifically targeted in gruesome, inhuman ways. 

In addition to many of the most talked about claims being false, such as the 40 beheaded babies, the Independent International Commission noted that “children were killed as part of general attacks on communities” and “proportionally fewer children were killed on 7 October in comparison to other age groups.” 

Children comprised five per cent of Oct. 7 civilian deaths, according to the Commission, and made up over 28 per cent of Israel’s population as of 2022. 

The Commission’s authors did not conclude either way “whether this was a result of a specific instruction or policy.”

Foreign policy’s impact on media

Fatah notes that editors would have reacted differently if this story was about the war in Ukraine and if it had Russian disinformation. 

“I think the pro-Israel stance is very tied to Canadian foreign policy,” says Fatah, noting that the trend of national foreign policy influencing newsrooms is not limited to Canada. 

Discussing the notion of “objectivity,” Fatah questions whether newsrooms are really asking how “the inputs of foreign policy and cultural indoctrination [enter] into the ideas around a space. That’s why Russia is so easy to cover for the west, because almost everyone is on the same page. The Cold War legacy is very strong. There’s no complexity around coverage of Russia.”

“It’s not the same if it is about Israel. I think this connects with many, many bigger points,” including the Canadian education system, Holocaust memory, and Canadian foreign policy, says Fatah. This context, she says,  “prevents us from challenging these ideas in places like the newsroom where they should absolutely be challenged.”

When it comes to Israel, says Fatah, there are strategic foreign policy considerations for Canada. “It is in the Middle East, it is seen as the only democracy in the Middle East – which is interesting as an idea to begin with given Palestinians within Israel have second class citizenship – but it is seen as an ally in the region which supports the West against the fear of Iran. So, how much of that influences all of this coverage? It has a huge influence.”

Avoiding bias and meeting Global News’ professional standards?

While researching this article, The Grind looked at Global News journalist Stewart Bell’s social media account on X.com. 

Global News’ Ethical Code of Professional Conduct states that “Employees will conduct themselves on and off the job in such a way as to avoid any perception of bias or conflict of interest.”

Bell, we found, has regularly retweeted pro-Israel perspectives from his X.com account, including 22 reposts of the advocacy group Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs (CIJA) from Dec. 2023 to early Sept. 2024. None of these repostings expressed doubt in the claims put forward by the advocacy organization. CIJA, notably, spread the false “beheaded babies” claim on X.com on Oct. 10. 

As one example of Bell’s X.com account activity, when there was a pro-Palestine protest that passed by Mount Sinai hospital in Toronto on Feb 12., Bell reposted CIJA’s denunciation of the protest, along with a Toronto Police post and a post from a spokesperson for the pro-Israel advocacy organization Friends of Simon Weistenthal Centre. The CIJA post called for the resignation or firing of Canada’s Special Representative on Combating Islamophobia and called the protest antisemitic. 

Bell did not post anything pushing back on that narrative, such as Global News’ own reporting about the controversy, which included quotes from Jewish anti-Zionist groups who say the protest was not antisemitic and did not target the hospital.

Another way real or perceived bias can show up in reporting is how events are contextualized. In Bell’s article, which quotes kibbutz residents saying Hamas is “as cruel as the worst terrorists around the world,” he writes that Be’eri was “founded almost 80 years ago and known for its left-leaning, pro-peace politics.”

He could have noted that Be’eri was established in 1946 as part of the “11 points in the Negev” plan of the Jewish Agency, in which 11 settlements were quickly established one night in the Negev desert region in an effort to get the region to be given to the Zionist state when the United Nations drew the partition lines months later. 

Because of the considerable Palestinian (specifically Bedouin) population that had long lived there, it was expected that the region would go to the Palestinians in partition. But the establishment of the 11 settlements and other efforts led to the region going to the Zionist project on the 1947 partition map. 

After getting along relatively amicably together for months, according to an account from an Israeli whose father was there, in 1948 the settlers drove many Palestinian Bedouins from their villages and lands, killing many. Thousands of refugees fled to Gaza. 

Bell chose not to mention that part of the history.

Bell and his employer Corus declined to answer The Grind’s specific questions about whether his reporting and conduct meet Global News’ professional standards, including those of being honest, trustworthy, factual, fair, being right before being first, holding power to account and avoiding bias. 

Corus Entertainment communications specialist Anna Arnone reiterated only that “we stand by our journalism and will not be answering any more questions at this time.”

Global News and Postmedia: a shared past

Global and most of the newspapers now owned by Postmedia, including the flagship National Post, were until 2009 owned by the same company, called Canwest Global. 

Canwest Global went bankrupt in 2009 and Postmedia formed to take over the newspapers, with the Shaw family initially taking control of Global’s TV, radio, and web properties. Global was later sold to Corus Entertainment, its current owner. 

When Global and the newspapers were under the same ownership at Canwest Global, then-VP of Editorial Murdoch Davis said in the early 2000s that the company was “unabashedly pro-Israel.” The editorial line regarding Israel was tightly controlled, which caused complaints among editors and newspaper columnists, some of whom were demoted or decided to leave. 

This year, in April 2024, Postmedia Editor-in-Chief Rob Roberts wrote in an email to subscribers that “I feel privileged to be editor-in-chief of the National Post right now, leading a paper that has been Zionist in its commentary since it was founded 25 years ago.”

Corus Entertainment’s spokesperson said they would not answer The Grind’s questions about whether Global News maintains a pro-Israel editorial position.