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Good morning,

RIP to the dog ranked as the world’s oldest ever: 31-year-old Bobi, a purebred Rafeiro do Alentejo who lived on a farm in Portugal.

In an interview earlier this year, the dog’s owner said Bobi’s secret to a long life was “good food, fresh air and lots of love.”

Sounds about right.

Mosheh, Jill, & Courtney

Mo News Podcast: A daily conversation about the news that matters.

🗞 FACT CHECKING IN TIME OF WAR

In any news story, getting to the truth and cutting through misleading information or propaganda can be difficult. Multiply that by about a thousand during a time of war, particular the current Hamas-Israel conflict.

Hamas’ October 7th attack, and the ongoing war between Israel and the terrorist group, has generated a dangerous amount of incorrect or distorted information that is spreading rapidly — enough to obscure facts from fiction. This is one of the first major wars being fought in the social media age—where information travels globally in real time. Adding to the challenge: there are few journalists and news organizations on the ground inside Gaza with the borders shut.

EXHIBIT 1: GAZA HOSPITAL COMPLEX EXPLOSION
The early misreporting around the October 17 explosion at the Gaza hospital complex is a prime example of how irresponsible reporting can have damning implications. On Monday, six days after the blast, the NY Times published an editors’ note about its early coverage.

📍 Bottom line: The NY Times admits it messed up on the hospital story and took Hamas’ line without being transparent enough. And it wasn’t the only media outlet which did the same.

• Here’s how it played out: Within minutes of the explosion, the Hamas terrorist group blamed Israel for an airstrike, saying it destroyed a hospital and killed hundreds of Palestinians— without offering any proof to back up its claim. Hundreds of major media outlets around the world went with the story.

  

BUT, THEN….
In the subsequent hours, Israel released evidence from surveillance footage and phone calls between Hamas officials showing the explosion was caused by a failed rocket launch by the Islamic Jihad terror group. That assessment was later backed by President Biden, who said U.S. intel has its own data to support Israel’s evidence, backed up later by the UK and French governments.

Third party groups analyzing the data, as well as CNN, BBC and the Wall Street Journal, also came to the same conclusion. Daytime photos the following morning also showed the explosion actually took place in the hospital parking lot, rather than leveling the hospital, as Hamas initially claimed.

But the damage was already done:

• Within hours, the false narrative that Israel purposely bombed a hospital and killed hundreds of people led Arab leaders to cancel an important meeting with President Biden, and led tens of thousands of demonstrators to protest in Arab capitals, including throwing molotov cocktails at US and Israeli diplomatic posts.

  • The coverage could have been so damaging, an opinion piece in The Hill asks: “If the news media were trying to start World War III, what would they do differently? The way the news business has acquitted itself this week, it sure seems as if it’s trying to instigate all-out global conflict.”

In its statement yesterday, the New York Times admitted it was wrong for relying too heavily on claims by Hamas without first verifying those claims. “The report left readers with an incorrect impression about what was known and how credible the account was.”

One week later: Hamas authorities swiftly put the death toll at 500, a number that was also reported as fact despite a lack of evidence. U.S. intelligence now believes the death toll is closer to 100-300; EU officials have said it’s closer to 50.

What Hamas is saying: Hamas is denying all evidence that the rocket came from within Gaza, but won’t reveal any evidence of its own, claiming all of it vanished. Arab governments are still going with the first story and pinning the blame on Israel.

THE INFLUENCE OF SOCIAL MEDIA
Journalists are facing the challenge of covering the war both utilizing social media and competing with the platforms. They feel they are in a race to confirm information and images that have gone viral, including posts from inside Gaza—where most western media companies do not currently have access. Unfortunately social media is full of false and misleading posts — so many, that some people begin questioning the stories that are true.

• Hamas, like other terrorist groups, has exploited social media to promote its cause, even hijacking victims’ social media accounts to spread their message of terror.

• To a lesser extent, but still crucial, media organizations also have to take time to vet the information and spin coming from Israel and western governments.

• We are also seeing the same thing we experienced on social media in the first couple months of the Ukraine war—a deluge of old videos from previous conflicts or new videos that are genuine, but taken out of context.

• A paper in the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism cites the main risks to journalism in the social media era are growing concerns regarding accuracy and disinformation, a greater need for double or triple verification, and the loss of control over the information once it’s published.

ISRAEL RELEASES RAW VIDEO OF ATTACK
Israel held a screening Monday for more than 200 journalists, which included raw and unedited audio and video taken from Hamas terrorists’ body cameras and phones as they massacred communities on Israel’s border with Gaza.

• WARNING: GRAPHIC DESCRIPTIONS In addition to clips of Hamas attackers shooting people, the 43-minute compilation contained graphic images of children being murdered, bodies burned, civilians being mowed down and other atrocities.

• The Israeli government’s decision to broadcast the footage came as it is increasingly concerned that people are questioning the scale and depravity of Hamas’ massacre.

• Social media users and some journalists have expressed skepticism about widespread reports and testimonies of the attack’s most harrowing details regarding the rape, murder and burning of victims.

The IDF has taken delegations of foreign journalists into some of the hardest-hit communities, with one spokesperson saying just days after the attack, “Walking through here is like Eisenhower walking through (Holocaust concentration camps)… and seeing the destruction and carnage. The world needs to witness this firsthand.”

BY THE NUMBERS:

• In just two years, the number of U.S. adults who say they regularly get news from TikTok nearly tripled.

• Americans’ trust in traditional news outlets has eroded: just 7% of Americans have "a great deal" of trust and confidence in the media, near a record low

• The rise of A.I. is making a bad situation worse: 70% of people think “the spread of false information online” is a major threat to their country.

⏳ SPEED READ

🚨NATION

📌 As the House GOP struggles to pick a speaker, a lawmaker aims to simplify the process (NPR)

📌 An off-duty pilot tried to disrupt an Alaska Airlines flight’s engines before being subdued, airline says (CNN)

📌 Sen. Bob Menendez pleads not guilty to foreign agent charge in corruption case (CNBC)

📌 Suspect vehicle in Maryland judge's killing found while alleged shooter still on the run (FOX NEWS)

🌎 AROUND THE WORLD

📌 Philippines says Chinese coastguard 'intentionally' collided with its boats (REUTERS)

📌 Venezuela opposition leader Maria Corina Machado claims presidential primary win amid early results (NBC NEWS)

📌 Iranian teen ‘brain dead’ following alleged assault by morality police (CNN)

📌 Bobi, the world's oldest dog ever, dies at age 31 (BBC)

📱BUSINESS, SCIENCE & TECH

📌 Biden names technology hubs for 32 states and Puerto Rico to help the industry and create jobs (ABC NEWS)

📌 Stellantis 'outraged' over UAW strike at Ram 1500 plant (DETROIT NEWS)

📌 Chevron to acquire Hess Oil in $53 billion deal (FOX BUSINESS)

📌 China rattles foreign firms with new arrests, Foxconn probe (BLOOMBERG)

🎬 SPORTS & ENTERTAINMENT

📌 Mary Lou Retton is home, recovering after hospitalization, daughter says (USA TODAY)

📌 Jay-Z wants you to take the $500,000 over lunch with him (CNN)

📌 Dwayne Johnson says he's contacted Paris museum to update his wax figure: 'starting with my skin color' (PEOPLE)

📌 Pink reveals she almost died of a drug overdose as a teenager (CNN)

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🗓 ON THIS DAY: OCTOBER 24

• 1940: The 40-hour workweek went into effect under the U.S. Fair Labor Standards Act. It came 14 years after Ford Motor Company first adopted the five-day, 40-hour work week.

• 1945: The charter for the United Nations enters into force with the goal of maintaining world peace after WWII.

• 1971: Don McLean releases his second studio album, 'American Pie.'

• 2003: Supersonic passenger service ended as British Airways flew its last Concorde flight. Air France had ceased similar operations in May.

• 2006: Taylor Swift released her debut studio album. And the rest is history…