I apologize for beating the-corporate-media-is-irredeemable drum again this week, but revelations that “freelance news photographers” may have gone on ride-alongs with Hamas terrorists as they butchered civilians and grabbed hostages in Israel is too nauseating to ignore.

Perhaps you heard: A quartet of photographers in Gaza who make their money selling news photos to CNN, Reuters, The New York Times, AP and other outlets have been accused of having advance knowledge of the October 7 attack on Israeli civilians and did nothing to stop it.

Worse, they arrived on the scene and calmly began shooting photos.

A web-based news organization called “honest reporting” broke the story. 

On October 7, Hamas terrorists were not the only ones who documented the war crimes they had committed during their deadly rampage across southern Israel. Some of their atrocities were captured by Gaza-based photojournalists working for the Associated Press and Reuters news agencies whose early morning presence at the breached border area raises serious ethical questions.

When international news agencies decide to pay for material that has been captured under such problematic circumstances, their standards may be questioned and their audience deserves to know about it. And if their people on the ground actively or passively collaborated with Hamas to get the shots, they should be called out to redefine the border between journalism and barbarism.

One of the basic rules of journalism is that reporters try to stay neutral in most situations. But any journalist with advance knowledge of murder or other crime has an ethical and moral duty to report it and try to stop it. Certainly they shouldn’t stand by and get exclusive photos of the obscenities underway.

These four photographers were mighty chummy with the terrorists.

CNN and the AP announced Thursday that they had cut ties with photographer Hassan Eslaiah. Neither news outlet elaborated.

Meanwhile, Israeli officials are outraged, especially Benny Gantz, a member of Israel’s war council.

Journalists who risk their lives to cover wars have terrifyingly dangerous jobs. Now that several of their number have been accused of collaborating with terrorists to get scoops, they are all in peril.

The corporate media has been corrupt and biased for years. Their reckless behavior has now endangered the brave, legit reporters trying to cover the news in Israel.

If you needed another reason to distrust the legacy media, a little watchdog group called honestreporting.com just gave you one.