CAIRO, Oct 22 (Reuters) - Israeli fire killed one person in a car in Gaza City and at least two others in other parts of the enclave on Thursday, health officials there said. A crowd gathered around the burning wreckage in Gaza City's Tel Al-Hawa neighbourhood as orange-vested emergency workers sprayed it with water, photos from the scene showed. Another strike killed a Palestinian man on a bike in the southern city of Khan Younis, and gunfire killed a woman near the Jabalia refugee camp, in the north, the medics added.
Left out here: Leaves out what changes the picture
Reuters' report of the same day counts a fourth person killed, a man near Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza. Without it a reader believes Israeli fire killed three people that Thursday, not at least four.
The Israeli military said they had struck a Hamas militant in Khan Younis, without giving further details. The military added they were still checking reports of the strikes in Jabalia and Gaza City's Tel Al-Hawa suburb. Israel, which says the Hamas militant group has been rearming and launching attacks in violation of a year-old ceasefire, has stepped up strikes on the group in recent weeks. Hamas has denied trying to carry out attacks or rebuild its arsenal and accuses Israel of undermining the Gaza peace deal.
Last year's US-brokered ceasefire calls for eventual reconstruction of the territory. But little progress has been made as negotiators have failed to agree terms for Hamas to disarm and Israel to withdraw its troops. Israeli airstrikes have continued. At least 1,500 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza since the ceasefire, according to the territory's health officials, while Israel says four soldiers have been killed. Palestinian authorities say more than 74,000 people have been killed in Israel's assault on Gaza, launched after Hamas-led fighters killed about 1,200 people in southern Israel on October 7, 2023. (Reporting by Nidal al-Mughrabi; Editing by Andrew Heavens)
Al-Monitor's reprint of a Reuters report names Israeli fire as the killer in the headline and lead. It then says in its own voice that Israel's stepped-up strikes are aimed at Hamas, although the dead include a woman, a man on a bike and a person in a car whom the army had not identified. It also attributes the Palestinian death toll to Palestinian authorities while stating the Israeli toll of 7 October as plain fact.
Doubts one side's dead and not the other's
Serious
“Palestinian authorities say more than 74,000 people have been killed in Israel's assault on Gaza, launched after Hamas-led fighters killed about 1,200 people in southern Israel”
Why this matters
The sentence hangs the Palestinian toll on "Palestinian authorities say". In the same sentence it states the Israeli toll of about 1,200 as plain fact.
The impression it gives
The reader takes the Israeli dead as established and the Palestinian dead as a claim by one party.
The context
Both figures come from the authorities on each side. Only the Palestinian figure carries a source tag here. That is the one-way treatment NewsCord documented in BBC coverage.
How we know
On the recordNewsCord's reading of five BBC Complaints Team responses found the BBC attaches verification caveats to Palestinian casualty figures while treating Israeli government denials as sufficient on their own, without caveat.newscord.org (opens in a new tab)
More than 74,000 Palestinians have been killed in Israel's assault on Gaza, according to Gaza's health ministry, launched after Hamas-led fighters killed about 1,200 people in southern Israel on October 7, 2023, according to Israeli figures.
States one side's claim as fact
Minor
“has stepped up strikes on the group in recent weeks”
Why this matters
Only the rearming claim is attributed to Israel. The words "strikes on the group" then tell the reader, in the outlet's own voice, that the stepped-up strikes are aimed at Hamas.
The impression it gives
The reader believes Israel's recent strikes, including the ones reported here, are hitting Hamas.
The context
The article's own dead include a woman shot near Jabalia and a person in a burning car in Tel Al-Hawa. The army said it was still checking those incidents and gave no detail on the Khan Younis strike. That the strikes target Hamas is Israel's claim, not an established fact.
How we know
Elsewhere in the article“still checking reports of the strikes”
Elsewhere in the article“gunfire killed a woman near the Jabalia refugee camp”
The article carries the army's word that the man on a bike killed in Khan Younis was a Hamas militant. It gives no name and no check, only the note "without giving further details".
The impression it gives
The reader is likely to accept that the man killed in Khan Younis was a fighter.
The context
Nothing in the article identifies the man beyond the medics' description of a Palestinian man on a bike. The army's label rests on its own word alone, and the article never says the label is unverified.
How we know
Elsewhere in the article“Another strike killed a Palestinian man on a bike”
Reuters' report of the same day counts a fourth person killed, a man near Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza. Without it a reader believes Israeli fire killed three people that Thursday, not at least four.