Media top headlines May 17
The Associated Press facing scrutiny for claims it didn't know it shared a building with Hamas and more round out today's top media headlines.
The New York Times was the focus of more criticism following an article Saturday that seemingly blamed former President Donald Trump for the ongoing violence between Hamas and Israel.
The article, by Times writer Michael Crowley, claimed the conflict was "renewing criticism of Mr. Trump's approach" to Middle East tensions, arguing the Trump-brokered Abraham Accords that opened diplomatic ties between Israel and multiple Arab neighbors had the effect of further worsening Israeli-Palestinian tensions.
"The accords he [Trump] helped negotiate were widely seen as demonstrating declining interest on the part of some of Israel’s Arab neighbors in backing the Palestinians, giving Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel more latitude to pursue strategies that further intensified Israeli-Palestinian tensions," Crowley wrote, before citing various other detractors who talked about the peace deal's importance, but were less optimistic in its future because of the conflict.
Crowley went on to describe the condemnations Israel received from current and potential members of the deal over the conflict, and attempted to further paint the Trump administration as a major stoker of tensions between Israel and the Palestinians by citing a former Obama administration official who claimed that the current violence "at least partially is driven by the fact that the Trump administration supported extremist elements in Israel every step of the way." He cited "Israel's settlement movement" as an example.
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"This is silly - President Trump brings peace to the Middle East, Biden screws it all up, so the @nytimes tries to hit Trump over it???" Trump senior advisor Jason Miller reacted on social media to the article.
Others also took to social media to criticize the liberal paper and defend the Trump administration's actions.
The United Arab Emirates, one of the Arab nations that made a deal last year to establish official ties to Israel, has reportedly warned Hamas it could pull investments out of the impoverished Gaza Strip if it does not commit to "calm."
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Other left-wing media outlets and liberal media figures also attempted to draw a line between the Trump administration's actions and the ongoing conflict in Israel, including The Washington Post, which spent the better part of a week trashing the administration for violence that's occurred months after it left office.