Well, I just got hung up on again. This time by an editor on the Los Angeles Times foreign desk. I had called and attempted, as politely as possible, to give him a correction for the story on the Times’ website tonight. This will probably be their front-page lead news story tomorrow morning. The headline proclaims: “Palestinian Suicide bomber Shatters Calm of late.” The lead sentence then goes on to state that this bomber “shattered a months-long period of relative calm…” The fact is, however, that the truce and this “calm” were shattered long before this. The last suicide bombing against Israeli civilians was Nov. 1, 2004. It took three Israeli lives. Since that time, while Israelis have basked in “relative calm,” 170 Palestinian men, women, and children have been killed. Read more about The LA Times' notion of "relative calm"
The Star Tribune’s editorial (“Aiding Abbas”, Feb 12th) lauded President Bush’s “remarkable new initiative, a $350 million fund for Palestinian humanitarian and security projects, which would give the peace process important new momentum.” The problem is that part of the money is earmarked for human rights violations. Glenn Kessler noted in the Feb 6th Washington Post, that “A White House official said $50 million of the $350 million that Bush announced in his State of the Union address to ‘support Palestinian political, economic, and security reforms’ could be given to Israel for [checkpoint] terminals because faster passage through Israeli checkpoints is presumed to be a help to the Palestinian economy.” EI’s Nigel Parry challenged the Star Tribune in this unpublished letter. Read more about Star Tribune praises President Bush's commitment to a human rights violation
Two innocent Palestinians were killed by the Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) on 12 January 2005. Although they were the latest in a long line of Palestinian victims, and from a tiny village near Ramallah, they made headlines all over the world. They were the first Palestinians to be assassinated by the IOF since the election of Mahmoud Abbas, which had taken place just three days before. The so-called ‘period of restraint’ had come to an abrupt end with the killings. For this reason, the assassinations were portrayed by the commercial media as a necessary response to two violent militants who had opened fire at Israeli soldiers. However, eyewitnesses on the ground report an entirely different story. Read more about Behind Israel's official version of the news
EI’s Ali Abunimah responds to an editorial in Ha’aretz, and points out that the majority of Palestinians, those living in exile, were not permitted to participate in the Palestinian Authority election, and that “a Palestinian Authority leader preselected by the international community on the basis of his willingness to surrender to Israel’s insatiable demands, and not elected by the vast majority of Palestinians, has absolutely no mandate to negotiate away our rights and will never be able to do so.” Read more about Palestinian Authority election excludes most Palestinians
How many Palestinians in the occupied territories actually voted in the January 9 election for president of the Palestinian Authority? Many major media organizations are reporting a turnout close to 70 percent. In fact the turnout was well below 50 percent as EI’s Ali Abunimah explains. The distinction between registered and unregistered voters is crucial to understanding the actual turnout figure, but it is a distinction the media have failed to grasp. Read more about Media grossly exaggerate Palestinian voter turnout
Today, is the last day of the election campaign. Media reports say that the Israeli army will halt operations in the occupied Palestinian territories “to avoid interfering with Sunday’s elections”, however, Israel has already interfered with the elections since the start of the election campaign. Since November 25, Israeli forces have killed 68 Palestinians in the occupied Palestinian territories. Most of them in the Gaza Strip. Seven Palestinians have been killed in the West Bank. EI’s Arjan El Fassed cautions media from reporting the elections were “free”. Read more about Israeli conduct in West Bank and Gaza did not change during election campaign
On Morning Edition on 6 January 2005, NPR issued the following correction: “In a story about upcoming Palestinian elections, Presidential candidate Mahmoud Abbas was quoted as labeling Israel as the “Zionist enemy.” We could have given more context for his statement. We said it was in response to violence, but did not specify that the violence was an Israeli tank shell that killed seven Palestinians.” In a letter to Jeffrey Dvorkin, National Public Radio’s Ombudsman, Nigel Parry challenges NPR’s cunningly worded correction. Read more about Challenging NPR's cunningly worded "correction"
NPR’s Morning Edition featured a report about the upcoming election for Palestinian Authority president in the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip. The report highlighted that PLO leader Mahmoud Abbas described Israel as the “Zionist enemy,” but omitted any mention of the context — reaction to the killing that day of seven Palestinian children by Israeli occupation forces in the northern Gaza Strip. This continues a pattern of bias long-documented in NPR’s reporting. Read more about NPR hides an atrocity but highlights the reaction
Last week Zachary Wales read New York Times’ Greg Myre’s latest attempt to save Israel from itself. The article, titled, “Israeli TV Tackles War for Hearts and Minds,” described Israel’s new “reality” show, The Ambassador, in which multi-lingual Israeli youths are flown around the world vying for bragging rights in Israel’s propaganda campaign. The show’s most recent loser, Ofra Bin Nun, took her exit after trying to “make it clear that Israel has not taken anything from anyone” (her words). Myre wrote about a “reality” show while ignoring “reality” altogether. The Ambassador’s judge is a former Israeli military spokesperson — a burning bush of irony that Myre somehow misses. Read more about The New York Times: Reality Bites
The New York Times’s coverage of the death of Arafat, particularly with its November 12th Op-Ed essays, exemplifies what is so wrong with American perspectives of the Palestinian struggle for independence. What voices are missing? Palestinian ones. This is the recurring problem of American and European approaches to the Middle East. Arab voices are systematically undervalued, discounted, or actively suppressed — not just by their own autocrats but also by Westerners claiming to be acting “in Arabs’ best interests”, as if the Arabs were children needing a Western parent. Read more about New York Times coverage of Arafat's death
