The Overseas Press Club is facing scrutiny over its decision to bestow a prestigious award to The Washington Post that recognizes its reporting on the Israel-Hamas war, even as the paper has drawn criticism for major factual errors and accusations of institutional bias related to its handling of the ongoing conflict in Gaza.

The newspaper is set to be honored at the Overseas Press Club’s annual awards dinner in New York City on Thursday, when it will receive the organization’s Shireen Abu Akleh Award, named for the Palestinian journalist mistakenly killed by Israel while on assignment in the West Bank in 2022.

The inaugural award, which highlights the “best reporting on a continuing international conflict or crisis in any medium,” cites seven Post stories that, the judges wrote, “tore at official narratives through accountability journalism that centered the human costs of Israel’s war in Gaza.”

But one respected Middle East analyst is challenging the decision to reward the Post for its Middle East coverage in light of its errors while reporting on the war in Gaza. 

In a social media post on Tuesday, Rob Satloff, the executive director of The Washington Institute for Near East Policy who is among the most outspoken critics of the Post’s Middle East coverage, questioned how the Overseas Press Club had chosen to bestow “one of its most coveted awards” to a newspaper he said has consistently published “error-filled, lopsided reporting” on the Israel-Hamas war, “critiqued by me and others in excruciating detail on multiple occasions.”

Most notably, the paper has faced backlash for its long delay in appending a lengthy editor’s note to a factually challenged front-page story, published in 2023, about the struggles of premature Palestinian infants born in the West Bank and Israel who were separated from their parents amid the war in Gaza.

The editor’s note, which was quietly added to the story, listed multiple inaccuracies undermining its core claim that Palestinian mothers were required by the Israeli government to return to Gaza when their travel permits had expired. The editor’s note also acknowledged that the triple-bylined story had not initially sought comment from Israeli officials, “an omission that fell short of the Post’s standards for fairness.”

The paper, which has added significant corrections to other stories on the conflict, has faced additional criticism for the language it has used to characterize the conflict, such as describing Palestinian prisoners as “captives,” fueling accusations that its coverage of the war has effectively veered into activism. Shortly after Hamas’ terror attacks, for instance, some Post reporters signed an open letter claiming newsrooms are “accountable for dehumanizing rhetoric that has served to justify ethnic cleansing of Palestinians.” 

Last July, the paper was lambasted for publishing a story that appeared to criticize the parents of Omer Neutra, an Israeli American hostage killed by Hamas on Oct. 7 and whose body is being held in captivity, for not discussing the suffering in Gaza — even as both agreed the situation was “horrible” for Palestinians.

More recently, a Middle East reporter at the Post has come under fire due to online commentary in which she has called Israel an illegal state, openly identified as an anti-Zionist and signaled support for Hamas and Hezbollah, among other statements that have raised questions over her commitment to objectivity. The Post acknowledged last month that it is “aware of the alleged social media posts” and is “looking into” the matter, but has not shared further updates.

Owing to such issues, Satloff told Jewish Insider on Wednesday that the award “says more about the Overseas Press Club than about The Washington Post,” whose record “speaks for itself.”

In his social media post, Satloff also suggested that the award reflected the biases of the jury’s professional backgrounds. Most of the judges “had long experience reporting from the Palestinian side of the Arab-Israel conflict,” he wrote, adding that it had been a missed opportunity not to include other panelists “who have cut their professional teeth on reporting from” such “global hot-spots” as Ukraine, Sudan or Yemen.

“Did these judges check the sourcing, balance, accuracy and dispassionate exposition of narrative that should be the hallmark of award-winning journalism, especially in a wartime conflict fueled by passion on all sides?” he wrote in his critique on Tuesday. “Or is it more likely that most members of this jury simply decided to honor the reporting that was the most egregiously one-sided in its portrayal of the Hamas-Israel war?”

While none of the stories submitted for the award have yielded substantial corrections, one reporter who helped author three of the articles was the lead writer on the feature about Palestinian mothers that drew the editor’s note.

John Daniszewski, vice president and editor-at-large for standards at the Associated Press who served as chief judge for the Overseas Press Club Awards, told JI on Wednesday that he and the jury members had read Satloff’s comments “and would be open to having further discussion with him in the future.”

“We are also confident in the integrity of our awards process and in the professionalism and fairness of our jurors,” Daniszewski continued. “We do not consider previous experience covering the Middle East to be disqualifying for judges.”

A spokesperson for the Post told JI, “We are proud of The Washington Post’s reporting on Israeli forces’ conduct in Gaza, and we’re gratified our journalism is being honored by the Overseas Press Club of America.”

But even inside the Post newsroom, the award has not been universally celebrated among editorial staffers. One Post reporter, speaking anonymously to avoid professional backlash, expressed harsh criticism of the newspaper’s coverage of Israel and Gaza, saying that it “deserves more corrections and more editor’s notes, not awards.”

“Factual errors are rarely corrected. Hamas’ activities are hidden. It commits ‘bothsidesism’ in stories about antisemitism. Even worse, my colleagues are incurious about investigating questions that would confirm Israel’s perspective,” the reporter told JI.

The reporter indicated that such sentiments are not widely shared within the newsroom, however, even as its editorial leadership has worked to reposition its coverage in a more moderate direction. (The Post’s CEO and publisher, Will Lewis, has reportedly voiced private concerns with coverage he and others have interpreted as biased against Israel.) 

“At least a few other Post staffers are distressed by how our principles seem to have been discarded when covering Israel and the Middle East,” said the reporter.