NY Times Admits ‘Error of Judgment’ in Publishing Political Cartoon With ‘Anti-Semitic Tropes’

Read editors’ note regarding “offensive image”

New York Times
Getty Images

The New York Times has acknowledged an “error of judgment” in publishing a political cartoon with “anti-Semitic tropes.” The cartoon of President Trump and Israeli prime minister Benjamin “Bibi” Netanyahu appeared in Thursday’s international print edition.

“The image was offensive,” the paper said in an editors’ note to be published in Monday’s international edition.

Read the Times’ full statement below.

The image, which the New York Times’ opinion section says was provided by The New York Times New Service and Syndicate, has since been deleted online. The cartoon depicts “the prime minister of Israel as a guide dog with a Star of David collar leading the president of the United States, shown wearing a skullcap,” per the New York Times’ description in its retraction.

The cartoon was part of the Times’ opinion section and appeared next to a column by Thomas Friedman about immigration, according to the Jerusalem Post.

The Jerusalem Post said the cartoon was available in Israel with “the end of the Passover holiday, coinciding with the holiday and Shabbat, two days when many observant Jews were not active online.”

Netanyahu has been the prime minister of Israel since 2009.

Comments