Ink Spots
Following the publication of Chris Gavaler’s column on Gaza in the July 15 issue of The News-Gazette, the paper received a rebuttal to the column from David M. Litman, U.S. media research manager at the Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting and Analysis (CAMERA). Wikipedia describes CAMERA as “an American nonprofit pro-Israel mediamonitoring, research, and membership organization.” CAMERA is headquartered in Boston, Mass.
Mr. Litman claims that The News-Gazette failed to fact-check Gavaler’s column, pointing specifically to the column’s claim of indiscriminate Israeli bombing of Gaza, of Israeli intent to commit genocide in Gaza, of continuing blockage of humanitarian aid deliveries to Gaza, and that Gaza has essentially been levelled by the bombing. Litman also challenges the impartiality of one of Gavaler’s sources, the U.N. Commission of Inquiry on Israel, stating that “dozens of countries have condemned the COI’s members for antisemitism.”
You can read Mr. Litman’s response to Mr. Gavaler’s column at https:// www.thenews-gazette.com/ article/14834,letter-to-thenews- gazette-david-litmancamera. Litman asks The News-Gazette, in his email to which his rebuttal was attached, “I urge you to, at the very least, correct the straightforward errors in Gaveler’s piece (e.g., his claim about aid being ‘blocked’ or his ‘90% ... leveled’ claim).”
On these two questions, I think there’s legitimate grounds for disagreement. The American Jewish Committee, in a July 9, 2026, release stated, “The October 2025 ceasefire significantly changed the humanitarian landscape. Israel expanded the flow of aid into Gaza, while international organizations continued working to address the enormous needs created by nearly two years of war. Yet disagreements persist over whether enough aid is entering Gaza, how it is being distributed, and the extent to which Hamas continues to interfere with humanitarian operations.”
Human Rights Watch (HRW) reported on May 19, 2026, that Israel closed all crossings into Gaza on Feb. 28 in response to the start of the war with Iran. Trucks entering in the following weeks fell from a weekly average of 4,200 to just 590, based on U.S. military coordination figures reported by Haaretz. HRW said that trucks have started to be let in again, but deliveries are below the pre-Iran war level and far short of what is needed in Gaza. (ww. hrw.org/news/2026/05/19/ gaza-israel-curbs-aid-killscivilians- during-ceasefire) As to whether Gaza has been 90 % leveled, Litman states that “The U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), an already questionable source for data (Litman’s assertion), has claimed that the air campaign has damaged 92% of housing units to some extent, but it has destroyed less than 37% of them. According to most recent estimates by the U.N. Satellite Centre, “approximately 81% of all structures in the Gaza Strip are damaged,” but again, the figure for “destroyed” is substantially less. The rest of the figure includes tens of thousands of “possibly damaged” structures.”
I will accept that using the word “level” may have technically overstated the situation in Gaza. Possibly devastated would have been a better choice of word. But, according to Litman, it would be accurate to say that 78 to 90 % of structures in Gaza are destroyed or damaged. That may not be leveled in the technical sense of the word, but it’s pretty close. If Lexington had received that kind of destruction, every news media in the country would probably have characterized Lexington as being “leveled.”
The fact that independent international journalists have been blocked from officially reporting from within Gaza since the outbreak of the war makes it difficult to determine what is fact and what is fiction. Governments have every incentive to present their version of “facts,” and without independent reporters to verify or dispute, those official pronouncements have to be taken with a grain of salt, whether they are issued by the U.S. government or the Israeli.
Litman wrote The News-Gazette on July 20. Last Friday morning what I believe was a coordinated campaign began of sending the exact same email, (all incidentally with my name misspelled). They differed only in the header, which did have a number of repeating identical wordings, and all seemingly from different senders – evading statutory prohibitions on spamming – to members of The News-Gazette staff, Washington and Lee University administration, and city, county, state and national officials. Between midday Friday and Sunday morning, when I finally created a filter to delete these using a keyword in the body of the email, we received over 1,800 emails. But not one phone call to discuss the matter.
Our examination of the July 15 column showed that the assertions in the piece were based upon reputable sources, and that the information presented was substantially accurate, again based upon those sources. Guest columnist Chris Gavaler wrote an opinion piece. He found credible sources that bolstered his argument. That’s good opinion writing, in my view. We stand by our guest columnist.
