The Pulitzer Prize for Commentary has gone to a Palestinian poet who justified Hamas’ taking of hostages during the October 7 terrorist attack, called the BBC a “propaganda machine” for its reporting of the Bibas killings, and blamed “the Zionists” for the arrest in Switzerland of a Palestinian activist.
HonestReporting, a US-based media watchdog dedicated to uncovering anti-Israel bias, found the damning posts on Mosab Abu Toha’s public Facebook and X accounts. The watchdog’s director Gil Hoffman said Abu Toha had “twisted facts” and called for the prize to be withdrawn.
The Pulitzer Prize Board gave Abu Toha the award on Tuesday for his writing in the New Yorker, which it described as “essays on the physical and emotional carnage in Gaza that combine deep reporting with the intimacy of memoir to convey the Palestinian experience of more than a year and a half of war with Israel”.
Former hostage Emily Damari, a dual UK-Israeli national, also criticised the Pulitzer board after it emerged that Abu Toha had denied that she was taken hostage.
“How on earth is this girl called a hostage? (And this is the case of most ‘hostages’)”, he posted to Facebook on 25 January. "This is Emily Damari, a 28 UK-Israeli soldier that Hamas detained on 10/7 … So this girl is called a ‘hostage’? This soldier who was close to the border with a city that she and her country have been occupying is called a ‘hostage’?”
Damari, who lost two fingers after being shot during the attack and was then held for 471 days, wrote in an open letter to the Board that Abu Toha “is the modern-day equivalent of a Holocaust denier. And by honouring him, you have joined him in the shadows of denial.”
“He has denied the murder of the Bibas family. He has questioned whether Agam Berger was truly a hostage. These are not word games – they are outright denials of documented atrocities,” she wrote on X.
On 3 February, Abu Toha wrote: “The Israeli ‘hostage’ Agam Berger, who was released days ago participates in her sister’s graduation from an Israeli Air Force officers’ course. These are the ones the world wants to share sympathy for, killers who join the army and have family in the army! These are the ones whom CNN, BBC and the likes humanise in articles and TV programmes and news bulletins.”
Berger, 20, was serving in the IDF during the October 7 attacks and was kidnapped from observation post on the Gaza border. HonestReporting said she had been held “hostage with none of the rights due to a prisoner who has gone through a legal process”.
Abu Toha also attacked the BBC, along with then-IDF spokesman Daniel Hagari, as a “propaganda machine” for reporting that the Bibas children had been killed by Hamas terrorists with their bare hands. “If you haven’t seen any evidence, why did you publish this. Well, that’s what you are, filthy people,” he posted on Facebook on 22 February.
Nir Oz resident Shiri Bibas, 33, and her two children Ariel, 5 and Kfir, 2, were killed in Hamas captivity.
Abu Toha also accused the Israeli soldiers and Israel’s government of random killing. On 10 January, he chastised the New York Times for the headline: “Israeli soldiers on vacation are being investigated for war crimes in Gaza.”
He posted in response: “‘On vacation’? You mean ‘on break from killing’, right? Come on, NYT.”
On 20 February, he posted, “Netanyahu paid a visit to the Tulkarem refugee camp today. He and his soldiers occupied a Palestinian home and they were planning to kill more children and their families.”
HonestReporting found that Abu Toha had violated the IHRA working definition of antisemitism, blaming “the Zionists” when Swiss police arrested Ali Abunimeh, co-founder of Electronic Intifada. He also accused Israel of genocide.
Abu Toha, who is a visiting fellow at Syracuse University’s English Department, told NPR on 15 October, 2024, that the media should “stop talking about Hamas” because “Hamas is not the cause of the problem”.
The Pulitzers, which are awarded by Columbia University on the recommendation of the Pulitzer Prize Board, have for years been criticised by conservatives for their allegedly politically biased selections.
In 2023 Mark Hemingway of The Federalist, in an article titled “For Five Straight Years, The Pulitzer Prizes Have Rewarded Misinformation”, wrote: “This many high-profile failures in such a short time makes winning a Pulitzer look definitively like a mark of ignominy.”
He quoted Phil Terzian, a Pulitzer finalist who had served on the nominating committee, who said that the prizes were “administered by Columbia University and the management of the New York Times largely for the benefit of the New York Times and a limited number of favoured publications and personalities.”
Abu Toha, the Pulitzer Prize Board and the New Yorker have been contacted for comment.
