An Agence-France Presse (AFP) news brief today termed the death of convicted Palestinian terrorist Hamdiyeh from throat cancer as “controversial”.

Setting the bar ever lower for disguising propaganda as news, AFP peddled the Palestinian-Authority’s blame for Hamdiyeh’s death on Netanyahu, fanning the flames of incitement against Israel.

Of course, the Palestinian Authority and other Arab regimes are particularly adept at conspiracy theories, having accused Israel of everything from planting sharks in the Sinai to sabotage Egyptian tourism (there was otherwise a mad rush to get kidnapped by Islamists) to baking bread with the blood of Palestinian children (rather lacking in originality, as this libel had originated in Medieval Europe).

When the mainstream media has stooped to reporting the death by natural causes of a Palestinian inmate in an Israeli jail as controversial, media coverage of Israel may have finally turned a corner into insanity.

In other news, no word yet on the outcome of the investigation into the death of Ayman Samarah 40, from Jenin, who was found dead in his Palestinian-Authority prison cell on March 1 after being arrested on February 28. PA security sources said that Samarah was known to suffer from “high blood pressure and diabetes”. Sounds controversial! His family claims he was tortured to death.

Seems like this has all the trappings of a controversy, but AFP let this go out of sight, out of mind.