Where is Israel?
Where is Israel?Screenshot

CNN sparked outrage this week after posting a news article on its website in which Israel was literally wiped off the map. 

The article, titled, "Beyond ISIS: 2016's scariest geopolitical hot spots," featured a graphic of the Middle East in which Israel is replaced with a red square marking the country of "Palestina."

According to HonestReporting, the picture, using a Spanish or Portuguese translation of "Palestine," was taken from Getty Images and not created by CNN's graphics team. 

Commenters to the site were quick to lambast CNN, asserting Israel would likely still be in existence next year.

HonestReporting Managing Editor Simon Plosker, meanwhile, slammed the news network's "illustration of the Middle East without Israel" as "completely unacceptable."

"At a time when the state’s very legitimacy is being called into question by vicious anti-Israel extremists, any message that Israel does not belong in the Middle East plays into this false narrative and feeds those like the Iranian ayatollahs who wish to see Israel erased from the map."

"How many times can CNN keep making these shoddy errors before the network takes remedial action to address its Israel problem? We fully expect CNN to replace this inaccurate map as quickly as possible."

Following the backlash, CNN took down the image of the map and replaced it with one of war-torn Aleppo in Syria.