Alan Dershowitz demands censorship of Al Jazeera Israel lobby film

Ali Abunimah Lobby Watch 13 March 2018

Alan Dershowitz speaking at a 2015 lecture. (Jewish Federation of Sarasota-Manatee)

Alan Dershowitz is calling for the government of Qatar to censor Al Jazeera’s suppressed film exposing the US Israel lobby.

In a letter on Monday he called for the channel to “reshoot and re-edit” the film before its release to add “pro-Israel commentators.”

Clayton Swisher, Al Jazeera’s head of investigations, revealed in an article for The Jewish Daily Forward on Friday that he ran into Dershowitz at a restaurant when the Harvard law professor and prominent propagandist for Israel was recently in the Qatari capital Doha.

Swisher offered Dershowitz a private screening of the film, which uses undercover footage shot by an Al Jazeera reporter who infiltrated powerful Israel lobby groups in Washington by posing as a pro-Israel activist.

“I have no problem with any of the secret filming,” Swisher says Dershowitz told him afterwards. “And I can even see this being broadcast on PBS” – the US public broadcaster.

“What I do take issue with is the lack of balance this program has, for example, not having a voice like me,” Dershowitz said, according to Swisher.

Now Dershowitz has offered his own account in a letter responding to Swisher.

Dershowitz says he watched an hour and a half of the four-hour film.

Smears

First, Dershowitz attacks the documentary, claiming the “framing of the film is by virulent and notorious anti-Israel commentators.” He then accuses Swisher of distorting his words to provide a “qualified seal of approval” to the “unfairly one-sided” film.

While smearing some of those interviewed in the documentary – he names The Israel Lobby author John Mearsheimer, journalist Max Blumenthal and former AIPAC staffer MJ Rosenberg – Dershowitz does not contest any reporting he saw by Al Jazeera’s undercover journalist.

Dershowitz also accuses Omar Barghouti, a founder of the boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) movement, of “blood libel,” for apparently referring to the well-documented statement by an Israeli minister calling for his “targeted civil elimination.”

The minister used Hebrew terms typically associated with assassinations.

Yet Dershowitz declares that the film does not meet “minimum standards of journalistic fairness.”

He protests that he would “not demand the censorship of this or any other anti-Israel video,” but then goes on to do precisely that, asserting that the government that funds Al Jazeera should dictate how journalists at the network do their work.

“If the Qatari government continues to finance Al Jazeera, it should insist that Al Jazeera meet acceptable journalistic standards, which include balance, objectivity and fairness in presenting all sides of a controversial issue, and avoiding anti-Semitic or other bigoted tropes,” Dershowitz states.

He also demands the film be fundamentally altered before airing, claiming that “the only way to cure the bias of the film [is] to reshoot and re-edit it with some neutral or pro-Israel commentators or narrators.”

Dershowitz demands all this as a condition for him to “participate in the re-editing.”

But when it comes to the work of Al Jazeera’s investigative unit, Dershowitz does not have a leg to stand on.

Vindicated

In January 2017, Al Jazeera broadcast an earlier series, The Lobby, that used an undercover reporter to infiltrate pro-Israel circles in the UK.

It included undercover footage of an Israeli embassy official plotting with a British civil servant to “take down” a UK government minister deemed too critical of Israel.

Outraged Israel lobby groups filed multiple complaints with the UK’s broadcasting regulator Ofcom.

But in October, Ofcom fully vindicated Al Jazeera, ruling that the four-part film was factually accurate, correctly observed rules on fairness, impartiality and privacy, and was not anti-Semitic.

Shortly after the UK film was broadcast, Israel lobby groups in Washingron apparently deduced that Al Jazeera had been running a similar undercover investigation in the US.

Al Jazeera’s head of investigations Clayton Swisher confirmed this following the Ofcom ruling and announced that the US film would be broadcast “very soon.”

But more than five months later, the film has not been shown.

This month, a source who’d seen it exclusively revealed to The Electronic Intifada the first details of what is in the film.

According to the source, the film identifies a number of lobby groups as working with Israel to spy on American citizens using sophisticated data gathering techniques. It is also said to cast light on covert efforts to smear and intimidate Americans seen as too critical of Israel.

The Electronic Intifada’s Asa Winstanley spoke to The Real News about what the source revealed:

Israel lobby groups have mounted a major pressure campaign on Qatar not to air the film, as Swisher confirmed in his Forward article.

That pressure has included recruiting US lawmakers, among them Senator Ted Cruz, to demand that the US government investigate Al Jazeera and require it to register as a “foreign agent,” as the Russian network RT was recently forced to do.

Qatar has meanwhile been cozying up to Israel lobby groups – hence Dershowitz’s repeated trips to Doha – as a way to win favor with the Trump administration.

“Foreign agent” threats

According to Max Blumenthal, Al Jazeera managers have assured their staff they will fight back against any move to invoke the Foreign Agents Registration Act – known as FARA – against them. But they are still silent about if and when the film will be shown.

Swisher too has fiercely defended the network’s editorial independence, noting that it has won multiple awards for its reporting all over the world.

But in a stinging line, he writes, “if our documentary does not air, it may well lend credibility to the claim these 14 US politicians have used and defamed us with – that Al Jazeera is indeed a foreign agent, at the direction and control of Qatar’s government.”

Now, in light of Dershowitz’s response to Swisher, some Qatari officials or Al Jazeera higher ups may see Dershowitz’s proposal to re-edit the film to introduce more “balance” as a face-saving way out, which would allow them to show the film while still appeasing Israel.

This would be a huge mistake. Dershowitz is not interested in “balance.” He is interested in doing damage control for Israel. He wants to dull the impact of hard-hitting reporting with spin, smear and propagandistic talking points.

Let’s recall that Dershowitz’s version of “balance” includes justifying Israel’s attacks on Palestinian civilians by accusing them of using their children as “human shields” so they can be killed just in order to embarrass Israel.

It also includes endorsing the US recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital – in defiance of international law and world opinion.

Due diligence

Al Jazeera has already done all the necessary due diligence required of UK-regulated broadcasters.

Swisher revealed in The Forward that Al Jazeera had sent more than 70 letters to individuals and organizations featured in the US documentary providing them with an opportunity to respond.

Only three did so.

Any pressure from Al Jazeera managers to alter the film along the lines proposed by Dershowitz would be to abandon any pretense of independence or integrity. It would also confirm the power of the very lobby the film seeks to expose to sunlight.

Al Jazeera’s reputation has already been badly tarnished by this affair. The only way to begin to repair the damage is for it to broadcast its investigation of the US Israel lobby, in full, without further delay.

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Comments

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Solly replied on

"Swisher offered Dershowitz a private screening of the film, which uses undercover footage shot by an Al Jazeera reporter who infiltrated powerful Israel lobby groups in Washington by posing as a pro-Israel activist."

As a journalist, you should not ever allow an outsider to review a story/video prior to publication. Swisher and a whole lot of incompetent AJ journalists need to be let

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Carl Zaisser replied on

Clayton Swisher was a member of Bill Clinton's team at Camp David in 2000. His account of the factual details of that 'summit' exposed the bias the US had in favor of Israel, and according to Mitchell Plitnick (former chief political advisor to Jewish Voice for Peace, and later an important member of Washington's branch of the Israeli human rights organization, B'Tselem) who told me, it was the best account of what had happened at Camp David. I consider Clayton Swisher to be a heroic figure and wish more people who have been on the inside of slimy government dealings would turn and tell the actual truth about what has been going on.

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The Renegade replied on

I cannot more than agree with Solly: to offer prevueing a documentary to an outsider could easily be understood as an invitation to censorship... I don't suppose (hope) this having been Swisher's idea!

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Larry White replied on

You have to hand it to the Dersch , he is the best promoter the film could get.This documantrary could have gone almost unnoticed and soon forgotten.Now it will get lots of free publicity it otherwise would not have received.

You have to love guys like dershowitz , who just don,t know when to shut up.

Keep up the good work prof .

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Donatus replied on

Al Jazeera should take Alan Dershowitz' demand of censoring the documentary as a compliment. Nobody would understand if this man of Israeli hasbara simply would laude seeing the Israel-lobby opposed to a mirror of truth.

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dave replied on

If Al Jazeera spikes the story or if they cave in to Dershowitz's demands, somebody from AJ should leak the film in its original form.

There's no reason for it to remain hidden in the age of the internet and WikiLeaks.

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Rob Roy replied on

This reminds me of the documentary film: "The Occupation of the American Mind: Israel's Public Relation War in the United States" directed by Sut Jhally and narrated by Roger Waters. As far as I can tell, it's being blocked and hasn't shown anywhere. I saw excerpts and it's a great film. Israel surely has a headlock on this country. Their occupation isn't just in Palestine.

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Kini... replied on

I have shown this film and continue to do so! Americans need to wake up...if you get a chance to see The Occupation of the American Mind, take your friends. It will blow you away. Israel has Americans believing all its propaganda! When Israel is done with America, they will not be a friend as they are not now. Americans are being used and so are our Politicians. WAKE UP!

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Rob Roy replied on

Kini,
Where have you seen it? I know it has been shown in other countries, but not the US. I saw excerpts but can't find it in any theaters.
Thanks, Rob

Ali Abunimah

Co-founder of The Electronic Intifada and author of The Battle for Justice in Palestine, now out from Haymarket Books.

Also wrote One Country: A Bold-Proposal to End the Israeli-Palestinian Impasse. Opinions are mine alone.