A new appointment to the paper’s Jerusalem bureau raises questions about the paper’s impartiality.

The New York Times is once again facing tough questions about its objectivity and impartiality regarding its coverage of Israel, as it has emerged that one of its most recent hires previously sought to justify and excuse terrorism against and, more specifically, blamed Israel for the actions of Palestinian suicide bombers who murdered hundreds of Israelis in the 2000s.

On November 3, The New York Times announced that it was welcoming a new reporter to its Jerusalem bureau. The press release on the Times’ website described Raja Abdulrahim as an “experienced foreign correspondent,” a “native Arabic speaker” and a “strong storyteller and writer.”

But that’s only part of the story.

In June 2002, while a junior at the University of Florida, Abdulrahim penned a guest column for the school newspaper, The Florida Independent Alligator, titled, “Palestinians driven to bombing,” in which she claimed:

“Another suicide bomber has attacked and the finger pointing has begun in every direction. But the fact is that the finger belongs not on the Palestinian Authority or some ‘Islamic militant group,’ it belongs squarely on Israel and the Israeli Defense Forces.”

This column was written during the most intense period of Palestinian suicide bombings in Israel.

Between 2000 and 2005, 141 suicide attacks claimed the lives of 587 people. In 2002 alone, there were no less than 47 lethal suicide bombings, which left 238 dead and many more injured. Among those killed were Holocaust survivors and pregnant women along with their unborn babies, as perpetrators deliberately targeted civilians.

They struck buses, cafes, discos, shopping malls and busy streets in a bid to kill as many Israelis as possible.

And yet, Abdulrahim sought to blame Israel — not the Palestinian Authority government or Palestinian terror groups such as Hamas — for the carnage.

There is a term for this: Victim-blaming.