Egyptian photo editor quits CNN after anti-Semitic tweets surface

JTA — A photo editor who began working at CNN in January has resigned after anti-Semitic tweets he made in 2011 were discovered.

Mohammed Elshamy, a 25-year-old former photojournalist with the Anadolu news agency, quit Thursday night after an employee of Israel’s Government Press Office flagged on Twitter some of the anti-Semitic statement by Elshamy, who recently graduated from Cairo University.

“More than 4 jewish pigs killed in #Jerusalem today by the Palestinian bomb explode. #Israel #Gaza,” one of his tweets, following a terrorist attack, read.

The bombing killed a Christian woman who was studying in Israel and severely injured a 14-year-old Israeli girl who died of her injuries six years later.

Hey @jaketapper@CNN have just hired this guy to be a photo editor

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As you can see he has written tweets explicitly glorifying terrorism & celebrating the murder of Jews simply because they are Jews. He’s a racist who collectively dehumanises Jews as “pigs”

What’s going on? pic.twitter.com/BRyZsprFmW

— leekern (@leekern13) July 25, 2019

“Despite everything happening now in Egypt, I’m proud of the army generation that liberated us from the zionist pigs @ 6 october 1973 #israel,” Elshamy, who worked at CNN’s Atlanta headquarters, wrote in another tweet from 2011, referencing the last war between Egypt and Israel.

I mean seriously – Mohammed is one deeply racist antisemitic bastard pic.twitter.com/nbkUhvEKXd

— leekern (@leekern13) July 25, 2019

“The network has accepted the resignation of a photo editor, who joined CNN earlier this year, after anti-Semitic statements he’d made in 2011 came to light,” the US network’s spokesman Matt Dornic said in a statement to several media outlets. “CNN is committed to maintaining a workplace in which every employee feels safe, secure and free from discrimination regardless of race, gender, sexual orientation or religion.”