New York Times defends controversial anti-Israel piece, 'no truth' to retraction claims

Note: This story contains graphic allegations of sexual violence.

The New York Times stood by one of its opinion writers on Tuesday after they wrote a controversial piece claiming that Palestinians were regularly being sexually abused by everyone from Israeli prison guards to dogs.

The paper's latest statement came in response to journalist David Shuster claiming that he heard reports of the NY Times planning on retracting opinion columnist Nicholas Kristof's piece after it received backlash from readers as well as the Israel Foreign Ministry.

"Hearing from longtime friends @nytimes there are already discussions, including up the masthead, about retracting @NickKristof column. Issues with source credibility and lack of evidence. No indications the Kristof sourcing mistakes were deliberate. Still problematic," Shuster wrote on X Monday night.

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The NY Times eventually responded to this claim, saying there was "no truth" to the rumor and defending Kristof as "one of the world’s best on-the-ground reporters."

"There is no truth to this at all. Nicholas Kristof is a two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist who has reported on sexual violence for decades, and is widely regarded as one of the world’s best on-the-ground reporters documenting and bearing witness to sexual abuse experienced by women and men in war and conflict zones," NY Times spokesperson Charlie Stadtlander said. 

He continued, "He traveled to the region to report firsthand on the stories of Palestinians who suffered abuse, and his article collects accounts in the victims’ own words, backed by independent studies."

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Kristof's piece headlined, "The Silence That Meets the Rape of Palestinians," featured men and women alleging "brutal sexual abuse at the hands of Israel’s prison guards, soldiers, settlers and interrogators." 

In the article, he alleged that Palestinians "had their genitals yanked or were beaten on the testicles," "some men had to have their testicles amputated by doctors," and metal batons were used to rape men. Kristof also said a Gaza journalist claimed he was "mounted" by a dog. 

Several commentators have called Kristof's report into question, remarking that many of the "14 men and women" he interviewed have ties to Hamas or anti-Israel activism.

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The Israeli Foreign Ministry condemned the piece, calling it "one of the worst blood libels ever to appear in the modern press" and warned that "the truth will prevail."

"In an unfathomable inversion of reality, and through an endless stream of baseless lies, propagandist Nicholas Kristof turns the victim into the accused. Israel - whose citizens were the victims of the most horrific sexual crimes committed by Hamas on October 7, and whose hostages were later subjected to further sexual abuse - is portrayed as the guilty party," the Israel Foreign Ministry wrote on X Monday.