The New York Times just proved — again — that the Pulitzer Prize is less a journalism award and more a participation trophy for terrorist sympathizers. Photographer Saher Alghorra, who was just awarded the 2026 Pulitzer Prize for breaking news photography, has been caught calling Hamas and jihadist militants “martyrs” and “resistance” fighters on his Instagram account while referring to Israel as an “occupation” force and accusing the country of waging a “war on Gaza’s children.”
The paper of record is now the paper of Hamas. Congratulations.
Alghorra, who is represented by the California-based agency Zuma, won the Pulitzer for his photography documenting what the Times framed as the humanitarian crisis in Gaza. But here’s where it gets fun. As the Washington Free Beacon’s Adam Kredo reported, Alghorra’s social media is a greatest hits album of jihadist cheerleading. “Martyrs.” “Resistance.” This isn’t neutral journalism language. This is the vocabulary of someone who has picked a side — and it’s not ours.
And about that prize-winning photo. The image that helped land Alghorra his Pulitzer depicted a malnourished child — heartbreaking stuff, designed to make you blame Israel. One problem: internal NYT communications obtained by Semafor revealed that the child had a pre-existing genetic condition. NYT Managing Editor Marc Lacey himself questioned the image, asking “when there is presumably no shortage of images of children who were not malnourished before the war and currently are?” Executive Editor Joe Kahn chimed in that “the story isn’t framed around people with special needs and the lead art really should not do that, either.”
So the editors KNEW. They knew the photo was misleading. They ran it anyway. And then the Pulitzer board handed the guy a trophy for it.
The media watchdog group Honest Reporting called it exactly what it is — “a prize built on staged scenes, a manufactured ‘famine’ narrative, and intimate access to Hamas terrorists.” Intimate access to Hamas terrorists. Let that one roll around your brain for a second. How does a photographer get that kind of access without being, shall we say, friendly with the management?
The Times, naturally, defended their guy. They posted on X that Alghorra “has documented hundreds of starving and malnourished children in Gaza, conducting intrepid photojournalism at personal risk.” Intrepid. Personal risk. They make him sound like a war hero instead of a propagandist who calls terrorists “martyrs” on Instagram.
This isn’t new territory for the Times, by the way. The paper famously won a Pulitzer back in the day for Walter Duranty’s coverage of the Soviet Union — coverage that deliberately covered up Stalin’s Holodomor, a man-made famine that killed millions. They never gave that one back, either. Some traditions die hard at the Gray Lady.
The Pulitzer Prize used to mean something. It used to mean you were the best at finding the truth and telling it. Now it means you got the best angle on a staged photo while your Instagram calls terrorists “martyrs.” The entire institution is a joke, and the New York Times is the punchline.
As reported by Conservative Review, Alghorra still has his job, still has his Pulitzer, and the Times still pretends this is all perfectly fine. The rest of us can see the building is on fire. They’re just hoping we won’t notice the smoke.