The Washington Free Beacon’s Ira Stoll reviews the 2026 Pulitizer Prize awarded to Saher Alghorra in breaking news photography. In the linked Free Beacon story Stoll reports that the Times is scrambling to defend the integrity of its Gaza-based photographer and his work after the press watchdog organization Honest Reporting accused him of “staged scenes” that were closely coordinated with Hamas.
Stoll’s backgrounder draws on the work of Honest Reporting criticizing Alghorra:
What has kicked up something of a storm—at least enough to generate an official if somewhat vague defense from the New York Times—is the prize to Times contributing photographer Saher Alghorra for pictures he took in areas of Gaza that were largely under the control of Hamas terrorists. The New York Times has conceded “Hamas restricts journalists in Gaza,” but it’s not clear how that affected the work of Alghorra, who, one prize website reports, “studied public relations, media and photography at the University of Palestine.” In 2024 a friend started a GoFundMe to try to raise $36,000 to evacuate him and his family from Gaza, but that campaign was paused.
The watchdog group Honest Reporting said the Alghorra Pulitzer is “a prize built on staged scenes, a manufactured ‘famine’ narrative, and intimate access to Hamas terrorists.”
Said Honest Reporting, “One of the winning photos shows 2‑year‑old Yazan Abu al‑Foul, turned by the NYT into the face of children ‘starving’ because of Israel. Yet the original wire copy notes that Yazan has four older siblings – none of whom appear in the Pulitzer portfolio – and the same mother and child were repeatedly shot by multiple agencies in near‑identical poses, raising serious questions about staging, consent and how one family was repackaged into a global ‘famine’ poster‑child.” Many of the emaciated-appearing children used in press photographs aimed at charging Israel with imposing starvation had underlying preexisting other health conditions that caused their distorted appearance, though Yazan Abu al‑Foul is not known to be one of those.
The watchdog group went on, “Another Pulitzer‑winning image shows Hamas terrorists in Khan Younis reportedly carrying the remains of an Israeli hostage – a glossy, carefully composed shot that by definition required close coordination and trust with an internationally‑designated terror group. And this is the same Saher Alghorra HonestReporting exposed for calling the Bibas family ‘prisoners’ in his own Instagram post, faithfully echoing Hamas’ language for murdered hostages.”
Said Honest Reporting, “By honoring him, the Pulitzers aren’t rewarding courageous war photography; they’re legitimizing Hamas‑adjacent narratives built on emotional manipulation, staged imagery and unrivaled access to a terror group. One day, people will ask how this passed as ‘journalism.’”
The Times speaks (or not):
The New York Times pushed back with a response on X. “Saher Alghorra has documented hundreds of starving and malnourished children in Gaza, conducting intrepid photojournalism at personal risk so readers can see the consequences of war. This attack on his work is baseless,” the newspaper said. “Jurors called Saher’s work a ‘distinguished example’ of breaking news photography for his spontaneous coverage of these scenes in Gaza.”
Asked for a more substantive response to the criticism, a Times spokesman referred the Washington Free Beacon back to the response posted on X.
See Honest Reporting’s critique of Alghorra’s work here. The Times itself has posted a selection of the work for which Alghorra was awarded the prize. This is the classic “starving child” photo referred to above:
2/
One of the winning photos shows 2‑year‑old Yazan Abu al‑Foul, turned by the NYT into the face of children “starving” because of Israel.Yet the original wire copy notes that Yazan has four older siblings – none of whom appear in the Pulitzer portfolio – and the same mother… pic.twitter.com/LfyaXvQGLp
— HonestReporting (@HonestReporting) May 5, 2026
You be the judge.
