Pacinthe Mattar, an Egyptian-Canadian writer, authored a December 18 column for the taxpayer-subsidized magazine The Walrus, “When It Matters Most, Student Journalists Are Showing Up.”

What followed was a one-sided litany of anti-Israel complaints. Given Mattar’s history, this was unsurprising. As HonestReporting Canada has previously reported, Mattar “has long exposed herself as a radical anti-Israel activist. She has denied Israel’s right to exist,called for more anti-Israel coverage in the news media, and has peddled conspiracy theories denying Hamas’ well-documented use of tunnels for its terrorism.”

In her recent piece, Mattar complained that the pro-Palestinian university encampments that took place during the spring of 2024 were written about in mainstream media in a way that the “writers seemed ready to dismiss the demonstrators and paint them negatively.”

This framing overlooked extensive, often sympathetic coverage in outlets such as The Toronto Star,CBC News,CityNews Winnipeg, and Le Devoir and La Presse, to name but a few.

Mattar painted the encampments as virtuous, writing that “the student press also fulfilled one of the most important tenets of journalism: making sure those in power were being watched.”

She bypassed entirely that there was a significant non-student presence at the encampments, with the encampment becoming a home base for activists with a range of agendas. She likewise ignored that the University of Toronto encampment was allegedly supported on campus by the Palestinian Youth Movement (PYM) and Samidoun: Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network. Both have expressed support for Hamas’ October 7, 2023, atrocities. Additionally, Samidoun is listed by Canada as a terrorist entity.

She didn’t mention that Jewish students were harassed on campus, including being denied entry to public spaces during the University of Toronto encampment, and university property was damaged.

However, Mattar continued to state that the student encampment was worthwhile because “they called on the university to disclose the names of all the companies it invests in, to divest from those providing military resources to the Israeli government, and to end all partnerships with institutions that either operate or support settlements outside Israel’s internationally recognized border.”

When Israel was invaded by its genocidal neighbour on October 7, 2023, Israel was forced to fight for its existence. Divesting from Israel’s military is denying Israel the right to defend itself.

Likewise, the settlement issue is a hot topic, with many, like international law expert Eugene Kontorovitch, long having argued that Israel’s presence in the West Bank is legal.

Mattar continued to accuse Israel of having “killed at least 100 journalists” by the summer of 2024, and that the journalists in Gaza are “Still starving and under siege by the Israeli military. While they have reported relentlessly on the onslaught that has decimated Gaza—killing over 67,000 people, at least one-third of them children—they have also been subject to the same hardships they are reporting on: displacement, drone strikes, and arrests.”

She ignored the facts yet again. As the Meir Amit Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center has reported, at least 60 percent of the alleged journalists killed in Gaza were affiliated with terror groups.

As for the casualty figures she referenced, they come from Hamas’s Gaza Health Ministry and include tens of thousands of fighters, as well as natural deaths, and have been thoroughly debunked, including because their data collection methods are unreliable.

As for starvation, Mattar predictably whitewashes Hamas’ role in Gaza’s suffering. They looted incoming aid and hoarded it, either reselling it at inflated prices to fund their terror, or just keeping it away from Gazans for media purposes as was blatantly obvious in the case of the tonnes of infant formula and nutritional shakes discovered in December.

The fact is that Hamas chose to prolong the war by holding onto the Israeli hostages – while starving and abusing them – for so long, and in doing so prolonged the war. But that doesn’t seem relevant to Mattar.

This piece ignored campus antisemitism, Hamas’ role in Gaza’s suffering, and Israel’s right to defend itself, all while presenting contested claims as fact.