Well, what this whole episode shows is that quite a few "respectable" (they've fully earned those quotes) "conservative" (more to the point irresponsible, radical, unreliable) publications fell hook, line, and sinker for the Breitbart.com lie. Fell for it and apparently did nothing to verify it. That leaves those reporters with little credibility as serious "spox" -- Breitbart.com calls spokespeople "spox" -- and their august editors scraping egg off their faces.
Among the publications involved, according to the New York Times, were the National Review (Buckley's bones are rattling) and the Washington Times.
Ben Shapiro was the Breitbart.com reporter. He's trying to get off the hook here by blaming three unnamed sources -- "Senate sources," according to the NYT - none of which was the Republican aide who apparently turned a joke into a serious story and a spread the word of the "contact" between Hagel and Hamas. Did Fox help spread the word? Not having TV in the house, I don't know. But maybe you heard it or saw it on Fox, too? Whatever else comes out of this, we now know conservative media are careless damn fools. Whether they don't want to fact-check or don't know how to doesn't matter.
There's no evidence that the organization named -- "Friends of Hamas" -- even exists. And certainly there's no evidence of Chuck Hagel's antipathy towards Israel. Like a probably pretty healthy majority of Americans, Israel is seen as a friendly nation.
What's not to like is the alliance between defense industry/lobbyists/politicians in this country with their counterparts in Israel. What's not to like and we should fear is anyone who says "here's how we're supposed to believe and people who don't won't get hired." The ties between the far right in Israel and the far right in the US should worry all Americans. Liberal Israelis don't like it. Liberal Americans don't like it. It's counterproductive and disloyal to honest people in both countries and beyond.
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