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Friday, April 30 2010You Call This a BBC Response?
Before publishing our in-depth analysis of BBC articles on the Mideast conflict (pdf format), we forwarded an advance copy to the Beeb for a response. We found a quantifiable imbalance between Palestinian and Israeli perspectives quoted, a lack of historical context, and other examples of "soft bias." They never replied. But the BBC gave a response to the Jewish Chronicle. It was -- unfortunately -- the party line we expected to hear:
Does the BBC's shoot-the-messenger approach reflect an inability to refute the points we raised, or just arrogance? Read HonestReporting's In-Depth Media Analyis of the BBC's coverage and judge for yourself. Thursday, April 29 2010Listen to HR Radio: Our Latest Podcast!
HR Radio hosts Yarden Frankl and Pesach Benson discuss the "soft" bias at the BBC and how it impacts Israel's public image.
Norway To Block Anti-Semitic TV Station?
Facing growing levels of anti-Semitism among Muslim students in Norway, Norwegian officials are considering blocking an Egyptian Islamic TV station over anti-Semitic broadcasts. Here's one appalling example of why Norway's Minister of Culture, Anniken Huitfeldt, calls Al-Rahma anti-Semitic and wants the Norwegian Media Authority to investigate:
MEMRI elaborates on the effects of the transmissions:
France already blocked Al-Rahma over this video featuring Egyptian cleric Hazem Shunam. Wednesday, April 28 2010April 28 Links
• Actor Gives Up Anti-IDF Role Tuesday, April 27 2010Globe & Mail: Polls Apart
I don't take online polls seriously because they're utterly unscientific, and government officials don't base their decisions on them. The only people who benefit are the newspapers -- these gimmicks boost web traffic in the guise of interactivity. Sometimes, however, the questions reveal more about the pollsters themselves. Case in point: HonestReporting Canada spotted a Globe & Mail poll asking whether Washington needs to lean on Israel to bring peace to the Mideast. Israel needs to be "leaned on" (i.e., pressured) either alone, or with the Palestinians. And the Palestinians can only be leaned on with Israel, but not by themselves. Plenty of children familiar with the multiple choice format could write out a question with the obvious options: Who should Washington lean on to bring peace to the Mideast? A) Israel As HR Canada aptly sums it up:
BBC Bias: An In-Depth Analysis
Our latest study reveals the BBC's selective focus on negatively portraying Israel while ignoring Palestinian incitement and glorification of terror. Read the full report here: BBC Bias: An In-Depth Analysis Ombudsman Weighs in On Blurred Distinctions Between News and Comment
Miami Herald editors are enamored with the idea of “columnist reporters” because they include first-person observations written with an edge. But ombudsman Edward Schumacher-Matos is uncomfortable with the blurred distinction between news and comment. The examples he cites deal with US politics, but the same problems apply to Mideast coverage too. The problem is basically how to A) balance a reporter's own insights of value, B) tell it like it is and C) do all that without inapproriate opinionating. It's a particular minefield for journalists who blog for their papers. Reporters can easily undermine their credibility with readers. Schumacher-Matos concludes with this food for thought:
(Hat tip: Romenesko) Monday, April 26 2010Knocking Down the Domino Theory
According to Haass, Mideast peace will actually complicate efforts to rein in Iran's nuclear program:
Meet AP's Latest 'Activist'
IDF forces killed Ali Sweiti, a wanted Hamas fugitive, after he barricaded himself in a house and fired on soldiers trying to arrest him. His rap sheet (I'll come back to that) screams "terror," but AP calls Sweiti an "activist." Here's Sweiti's record of "activism," courtesy the IDF Spokesperson blog:
How many Israelis have to be shot at before AP editors realize people like Sweiti are beyond the pale of "activism?" Now Hamas Has an Art Wing
According to Reuters, Hamas now has an "art" wing, to join its armed and political wings.
"Wielding art" sounds so innocuous. If a manipulative propaganda video is a sign of Islamic moderation, what's all the fuss about South Park? Sunday, April 25 2010Could Hamas Be Any More Disgusting?
Fathi Hamad, a key Hamas figure involved in negotiations for Gilad Shalit's release has a three-year-old daughter who was transferred to Jordan for urgent medical treatment. Israel allowed the transfer on humanitarian grounds.
And how did Hamas respond to the goodwill gesture? With a manipulative animated video depicting Gilad Shalit's return in a coffin to an old and gray father. The video ends with a renewed Hamas threat to kidnap more Israeli soldiers. Could Hamas be any more disgusting? Bungled Headline of the Day
Credit the Sydney Morning Herald with the Bungled Headline of the Day: You have to read the article to find out that the tourist "drew a knife on officers and priests at Jerusalem's Church of the Holy Sepulchre," and the "Israeli" was none other than a police officer. 3 Books I'd Recommend to Obama
Washington Post readers are weighing in on what books they recommend President Obama to read. I'm recommending three here.
See HonestReporting's recommended reading page. You can support HR by ordering the listed books through the Amazon links. What would you recommend the president to read? Thursday, April 22 2010Video: Is the Western Wall in Israel? - HR Interviews 'Confused' Tourists
Katyushas Fired At Eilat
According to YNet News, two Katyusha rockets were fired at Eilat. One apparently flew over the city, landing in the industrial zone of the adjacent Jordanian town of Aqaba. A second landed in the Red Sea. They were presumably fired from the Sinai peninsula. No indications of any casualties. Developing . . . Top 10 Media Subplots If Jerusalem Hosts Olympics
Judge for yourself whether Sommer overdosed on Salam Fayyad and Start Up Nation. In the meantime, here's my Top 10 List of Media Subplots If Jerusalem Hosts the 2020 Olympics. 10. British, Turkish and Greek windsurfing teams all feature veterans of previous Free Gaza flotillas. 9. Sick of wall-to-wall coverage of dumb events like speed walking, table tennis and skateboarding, the IDF restricts media access to certain venues. Relieved journos and the Nielsen ratings officials praise the news blackout. 8. The burning question: Will Anat Kamm leak Olympic drug test results to Haaretz? 7. Feuding Gaza vs. Palestine soccer teams give new meaning to "sudden death overtime." 6. Iran boycotts Olympiad, organizes alternative Islamic Nuclear Pride Games. President Hillary Clinton doesn't rule out US participation. 5. After Israeli hoopsters upset the USA Dream Team, players attribute victory to Olympic schedule which banned events and training on the Sabbath. But American sportswriters grumble about an Israel lobby undermining US interests. 4. Michael Phelps marries a Palestinian athlete and seeks UNRWA refugee status. 3. Security cameras catch Dubai's mysterious tennis team loaning passports to unsuspecting competitors. 2. Bloggers on warpath when Olympic judge Richard Goldstone repeatedly gives unusually low scores to Israeli gymnasts. 1. Will sparks fly at closing ceremony when Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat passes torch to Mayor Rahm Emanuel of 2024 host city Chicago? Wednesday, April 21 2010April 21 Links
The False Religion of Mideast Peace and Why I’m Not a Believer Israel Weighs Merits of Solo Attack on Iran A Taboo That Harms Arabs Too Stop Pasting Print Publications onto the iPad! The End of Free?
In the good old days, the Internet was a hub of free content. Things people paid for in the brick-and-mortar world - music, news, software – were readily available online in free digital versions. But while there is still a great deal of free stuff online, the tide appears to be turning against the “free” model, at least for content that has value in the real world. File-sharing sites such as Napster, which threatened to destroy the record industry, have largely disappeared, replaced by Itunes, which charges a small fee for each song. Like the recording industry, the newspaper business is betting that people are willing to pay a price for content. Ruport Murdoch’s Wall Street Journal has begun to charge for most of its content, and the New York Times plans to do the same starting next year. Other publications, such as the Financial Times are thriving behind their own pay walls. Social media services have also started seeing a shift. While the superpowers – Google, Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter – are likely to remain free thanks to their advertising revenues, smaller players aren’t so sure. Just this week, Ning, which allows people to create their own social networks, announced that it was phasing out its free service in order to devote all of its resources to paying customers. In a telling note, Ning CEO Jason Rosenthal said that 75% of its traffic was coming from subscribers to its premium service, meaning that the most active users were those who paid for the service. Commenting on the Ning announcement, technology blogger David Heinemeier Hansson put it best: “The just-give-it-away-for-free-and-they-will-come-and-we’ll-be-rich automatron is as broken now as it was in 2001.” So what does this shift mean for Israel’s public diplomacy? It means that media bias may become harder to monitor and to fight, but it would also reach a smaller audience. An uptick in pay walls on Internet services also means that today’s guerilla marketers will have a harder time spreading the news across the web. But Internet users have shown great resilience in keeping the Internet free. Expect new technologies to emerge to fill the gaps left by the emerging paywalls. Are you more likely to stop vising a paper like the NY Times over a paywall, or pay a small fee? Previously in Alex's series: People Support the Things They Help Build Montreal Radio Suspends Anti-Israel Programmer
Following complaints, CKUT Radio suspends "Under the Olive Tree" programmer Tariq Jeeroburkhan. See HonestReporting Canada's latest communique: Anti-Israel Programmer Suspended by Montreal Campus Radio Monday, April 19 2010Little Girl Asks Big Question
But my mind is on more immediate things: catching the next bus, work matters, and regret for not downing a coffee before rushing out the door. I tune the radio out of my headspace. We get off at our usual stop -- which happens to be across the street from the Mt. Herzl military cemetery. My son points to some policemen and soldiers milling around flags and setting up barricades for what was last night's nationally broadcast Remembrance Day ceremony. He then looks around the sky, vainly trying to get a fix on one of those helicopters we often hear, but never quite see. And then Rivka, my daughter, almost-nine, jars me with a question. "Abba, will there be a war?" Huh? When did my little girl start paying attention to talk radio? Is she looking for reassurance, or is this how she becomes a news junkie -- just like her father? Not wanting to alarm Rivka, I tell her I don't think there will be a war this summer, but there are people, like the king and some of the callers, who are concerned -- and they're talking about why. She then asks, "If there is a war, where will it be?" There's some kind of mature seriousness -- beyond Rivka's years -- in her voice. "Where will it be? That's a good question, Rivka'le. I don't know." What else can I say? The teachable moment ends with the arrival of our bus -- crowded and loud as usual. David Ben-Gurion once said, "Anyone who doesn't believe in miracles is not a realist." He was right. Miracles do happen. Jews celebrating 62 years of independence tonight is one of them. But 22,684 soldiers and security personnel have also died defending the land since 1860, and they teach us something about miracles too. (1860 is when the Jews of the Holy Land began settling other parts of the country outside the main communities of Jerusalem, Hebron and Safed). The fallen we honor today are 22,684 sobering reminders that we're not supposed to rely on miracles. My daughter's growing up. Don't I owe it to her to continue that conversation? Sunday, April 18 2010Imagine the Headlines if Israel Did This
From Voice of America:
Can you imagine the headlines if Israel demolished homes in eastern Jerusalem on a scale like that? AP Imposing Peace on Israel?
Israel fears Obama wants to impose peace. Unfortunately, AP's lead sentence legitimizes that imposition:
Unfairly labeling the Israeli government as "hardline" actually legitimizes the very imposition that Israel justifiably wants to avoid. I'm more worried that AP itself is trying to help impose a Mideast deal. Friday, April 16 2010Hezbollah Media Figure to Address World Editors Forum
The June gathering of the annual World Editors Forum (from Elder of Ziyon, via Forbes Biz Blog) includes a lunch meeting with Hassan Fadlallah. He's a Hezbollah MP who not only chairs parliament's media committee, he's also the news director of Hezbollah's Al-Manar TV. What's the value of the forum legitimizing one of Hezbollah's top propagandists? Fadlallah's views on jihadi journalism are well-known. Here's what came out when Jeffrey Goldberg interviewed Fadlallah in 2002:
So don't expect news executives to ask for Fadlallah's take on current media issues like job cuts in newsrooms, broadcasting to mobile devices, or paywalls. More problematic, however, is that Al-Manar is a designated terror group getting the WEF's stamp of legitimacy. This Washington Times editorial explains why Al-Manar broadcasts aren't protected by free speech. The same logic applies to the WEF's meeting with Fadlallah:
By the way, this year's gathering takes place in Beirut -- ruling out any chance of Israeli news executives attending. Hmmmmmm. Thursday, April 15 2010UK Bans Western Wall from Israel Tourism Ads
Simon Plosker on Rusty Mike Radio
You can download the interview here. Wednesday, April 14 2010Israeli Wonk Forced to Fisk His Own 'Interview'
I put the word interview in quote marks, because NRK's Mideast reporter, Sidsel Wold didn't really "interview" Gerstenfeld. "Harangue" would be a more appropriate verb. In a three minute piece, Gerstenfeld only spoke for 20 seconds before being cut off by Wold. Wold went on to answer her own questions and describe Gerstenfeld's views in her own words. She concluded the broadcast with a tangent, that to me supports Gerstenfeld's thesis. She said:
Norway, Israel and the Jews blog has a transcript of the broadcast. Gerstenfeld was left with the unusual task of fisking his own interview in an email to Wold obtained by Tundra Tabloids. Western Wall a No-Go Zone for Israeli Tourism Ad
According to Britain's Advertising Standards Authority, the Western Wall is a no-go zone for an Israeli Tourism Ministry ad. That's because the ASA judged in favor of a complainant who said the ad "misleadingly implied that East Jerusalem was part of the state of Israel." The ruling said:
Here's the ad in question. With the ASA on a slippery slope, how much longer till it adopts the even more radical view of PA media that Israel doesn't exist? Tuesday, April 13 2010Has Hezbollah Acquired Scud Missiles?
I can't wait to see how the Shiite terror organization's apologists explain this. Acquiring ballistic missiles isn't an example of an "armed wing" acting independently of Hezbollah's political and social agendas. As Hezbollah's no. 2 man, Naim Qassem told the LA Times last year:
What use does a "political party" or "welfare organization" have for ballistic missiles? Our Lucky iPad Winner
Congratulations to Nicole Moore of Buffalo, NY, who won HonestReporting's iPad giveaway. And thanks to everyone who participated. Monday, April 12 2010Unidentified Palestinian Sources Cross Their Wires
Gaza's only power plant resumed work at a limited capacity yesterday after being shut down for two days over a lack of fuel. Who to blame? That depends on which news service's unidentified Palestinian "sources" you choose to believe. AFP:
Palestinian sources are proving that you don't need to have electricity to cross your wires. Don't get me started on the reliability of Gaza's medical sources. . . Sunday, April 11 2010April 11 Links
Cast Lead Aftermath: Anti-Semitism on the Rise World-Wide A Case Study in Propaganda: A Day in the Life of the BBC A Link to Break: Iran and Mideast Peace Talks Richard Dawkins: I Will Arrest Pope Benedict XVI Israel Called On to Honour the 'Arab Schindler' Thursday, April 8 2010CBC Seeks Machete Wielding Spokesman Who Hates Zionists
CBC News is so open-minded about getting "the other side of the story" that their brains fell out. The story begins in Ottawa, where Nick Bergamini is vice-president of the Carleton University Students' Association and a well-known campus supporter of Israel. Bergamini and his Israeli roommate, Mark Klibanov, were attacked off campus by a group of people, one of whom swung a machete at Bergamini. The Ottawa Citizen leaves no doubt about the motive:
The attack made headlines across Canada, and Bergamini has been interviewed by countless news services. But the fourth year journalism student told talk show host Michael Coren that the CBC asked him for help getting "the other side of the story." What could possibly be "the other side of the story" of a student nearly getting killed by an armed gang of bigoted thugs?
That part of the conversation begins at the 8:51 point.
In the end, CBC reporter Jeff Sample filed this video report without any fresh quotes from "the other camp" of machete wielding spokesmen who hate Zionists. PA Names Street After Hamas Bomb Maker
The PA is naming a street after Hamas bomb maker Yehiye Ayash. The particular street is adjacent to Mahmoud Abbas' presidential compound.(!?) Ayash, better known as "The Engineer," was linked to attacks that killed 90 Israelis. The Shin Bet caught up with Ayash in 1996, killing him with -- appropriately enough -- a booby trapped cell phone. A month ago, the PA gave similar honor to the "heroine" of the 1978 Coastal Road massacre, Dalal Mughrabi. You're forgiven for not knowing about that -- AP picked up on that story two weeks late. That means I'll check the wire services in another two weeks for coverage of the new Ayash homage. Wednesday, April 7 2010Return of the Living Dead
See HonestReporting's latest media critiques: • Credibility of Palestinian medical sources questioned as teen allegedly shot dead by the IDF returns to his family alive only days later: Return of the Living Dead • A Financial Times op-ed draws on the false apartheid parallel: FT: Promoting Demonization & Boycotts 5 Reasons Why Aid to Israel Benefits US Taxpayers
He also notes four other reasons: joint R&D projects, Israel's strategic location as a port of call for American military forces, a forward base for US arms stockpiles, and finally, regional intelligence sharing efforts. Rep. Rothman concludes:
Also published at Bloomberg News. Book Reviewer's Background, Biases Need To Be Declared
The problem? David Heap, who reviewed a book with the ugly title, " Canada and Israel Building Apartheid," has his own partisan background, which the LFP never disclosed. Fegelman points out:
Read Fegelman's full response. Tuesday, April 6 2010Cleaning Up Comment is Free
Katharine Viner is slated to take over The Guardian's Comment is Free section. CiF Watch is disturbed for a number of reasons, including the fact that Viner co-wrote the controversial paean, "My Name is Rachel Corrie." Shortly before I took off for Passover, Haaretz interviewed Matt Seaton, the editor of The Guardian's Comment is Free section. It was a disappointing puff piece that didn't touch on the cess-pool of anti-Semitism and Israel-bashing freely posted at CiF. Newspapers have to take responsibility for incitement and hatred posted on their web sites. Balancing free speech with responsibility with what's practical for moderating thousands of comments is no mean feat. Don't overlook this, but better newspapers are mulling how to rake out the muck from reader comments. Chicago Tribune columnist Eric Zorn made some buzz in recent days by proposing what he calls "pseudonymity" (a consistent screen name linked to a profile including limited background info). And Washington Post ombudsman Andrew Alexander raises a tiered system that would group comments posted by trusted readers separately from off-topic, anonymous or invective comments. Both suggestions have their appeal. Strictly speaking, comment isn't really free. Every day, I invest varying degrees of time moderating comments on Backspin. This means screening out comment spam, trolls, inappropriate language, anything that, if posted, could lead to legal trouble. On occasion, I also get messages clearly not intended for publication. Bottom line: Web technology means talk is cheap. As Zorn and Alexander point out, comments don't have to be a free-for-all. Will Viner clean up CiF, or make it even more polarizing? Stay tuned . . . |
