Media mistake must not obscure genuine suffering

Every young journalist is taught that their career depends on spelling names correctly, not because the world turns on whether it’s Chaim or Haim Yankel, but because a simple error risks undermining trust in everything else we publish.

The danger of that lost confidence was powerfully illustrated this week when Getty Images distributed two dozen dramatic photographs of a skeletal Palestinian child.

The caption attached to the images identified the child as Muhammad Zakariya Ayyoub al-Matouq, an 18-month-old who “faces life threatening malnutrition as the humanitarian situation worsens due to ongoing Israeli attacks and blockade”.

The caption was wrong. It failed to disclose that Muhammad's skeletal body is, at least in part, a result of complex medical conditions which may account for his malnourished state.

The images of Muhammed were probably the most dramatic photos of a child to come out of Gaza and they were distributed via one of the world's most reputable agencies. Dozens of media outlets around the world published these photographs, The Jewish Independent included. The New York Times, the BBC, Reuters, and Associated Press were among those who reproduced the misleading information in good faith.

We join with them in expressing deep regret at our publication of misleading information. Media outlets rely on the professionalism of the journalists, photographers, and agencies that supply us and when they get it wrong, we must recognise and correct the error immediately. We removed the problematic image as soon as we were made aware of the deceptive caption.

Getty has since corrected the caption which now describes the child as “suffering from medical issues and displaying signs of malnutrition”.

The biggest problem with this incident is not that that the media made a mistake. Mistakes happen, especially in complex situations where getting information is difficult and international media outlets are dependent on agencies because financial and logistical limitations prevent them fielding their own journalists and photographers.

The deeper problem is that this case is now being used to deny the genuine suffering of Palestinians.

Investigative journalist David Collier’s posts on social media are a case in point. Collier, correctly, called out the error, citing a medical report from May 2025 which showed Muhammad has cerebral palsy, hypoxia and a "serious genetic disorder," and requires specialised formula and medication.

Addressing media outlets who published the image, Collier then wrote, "You exploited the image of a child with cerebral palsy to push a lie about famine. You did this because you’re all running campaigns to demonise Israel. You did not care anything about the truth. You saw an image you could use – or abuse – and ran with it.”

Yes, this photo went viral because it was so dramatic. The industry’s tendency to look for the strongest and most extreme illustration of anything frequently leads to distortions.

The skeletal image, reminiscent of starving Biafrans in the late 1960s, is not representative of the situation in Gaza.

But to deny that there is a real crisis in Gaza you must be willing to close your eyes to the thousands of other photographs, hours of video, and screeds of eyewitness reports. UNRWA, the UN relief agency for Palestinians, has several photographs of children suffering from Severe Acute Malnutrition which are not as photographically impactful as the Getty image but speak eloquently to the reality that many Gazans are malnourished.

UNRWA too has a credibility problem. The relief agency has been implicated in shielding Hamas terrorists among its aid workers.

But just as we cannot ignore all the other photos because of the innacurate caption on the Getty photo of Muhammad al-Matouq, we cannot use UNRWA's shielding of terrorists to deny the genuine need for humanitarian aid in Gaza and the capacity of the most experienced agency in the area to deliver it.

UNWRA's evidence is backed up by other agencies. The World Health Organisation identified 63 deaths from malnutrition in July, and found 5,000 children under five admitted for outpatient treatment of malnutrition in just the first two weeks of the month.

The World Food Programme (WFP) says more than one in three people in Gaza are going days at a time without eating. “The amount of food delivered to date is a tiny fraction of what a population of over two million people need to survive,” a WFP campaign states.

Israel's war against Hamas has unarguably been responsible for much of the hunger, with estimates that 85% of the population has been displaced. Israel blockaded humanitarian aid for several months and continues to limit and control aid through the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF).

The corrupt control of Hamas, which has shown it does not care about its own population, doubtless contributes to the problem.

Israel denies that it is using starvation as a weapon in Gaza. "Israel is presented as though we are applying a campaign of starvation in Gaza," Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told a Christian conference in Jerusalem on Sunday. "What a bold-faced lie. There is no policy of starvation in Gaza, and there is no starvation in Gaza."

Netanyahu might have been convincing had he stopped at "no policy of starvation", but his claim that there is "no starvation" is demonstrably false.

There is a dire need for aid and not enough of it is getting through. UNRWAsays it has the equivalent of 6,000 trucks of food and medicine ready to cross into Gaza.

Israel this week announced humanitarian pauses in Gaza to enable the delivery of food, medicine, and fuel. We welcome these pauses as a first step, but they are not enough.

It is well past time for a ceasefire that lasts. We must turn our attention to feeding the hungry and rebuilding Gaza, in the hope that it will one day be part of a sustainable Palestinian state living alongside Israel.