Ricki Hollander
BBC-WATCH: BBC Blames Israel Again
The two homicide bombings that rocked the Middle East on August 19, 2003 – targeting in Baghdad UN workers who had come to rebuild the country, and in Jerusalem Jewish families with young children returning from prayer at the Western Wall – elicited early sympathetic reaction on BBC. But it didn’t take very long for the network’s Web site to start implying fault on Israel’s part.
BBC-WATCH: The BBC on Egyptian Anti-Semitism
Evolution of a Cartoon
In recent months, many Americans have been dismayed to see mainstream media outlets publishing cartoons with anti-Israel and anti-Semitic images reminiscent of Nazi-era propaganda. The latest such drawing is one by syndicated cartoonist Tony Auth of United Press Syndicate in which a Star of David fences off Palestinians. Not only is the message about the purpose and impact of the fence completely inaccurate, its use of a Jewish religious symbol to excoriate the Jewish state evokes anti-Semitic cartoons popular in Nazi Germany and in the Arab press.
New York Times Turns to Comic-Book Journalist on Arab-Israeli Conflict
Cartoonist Joe Sacco has made it a professional goal to champion the Palestinian cause, presenting their perspectives on the Palestinian-Israeli conflict in easily-accessible, comic strip form to the American public. His longest work to date on this issue is a 9-issue comic book entitled "Palestine," originally published by Fantagraphics in 1993 and republished in book form in 2002 with an introduction by noted Palestinian polemicist Edward Said. Written after a 2-month backpacking stint in the Gaza Strip during the first Intifada, the comic book depicts Israeli interrogators, soldiers, and Jewish settlers brutalizing and harassing innocent Palestinians.
The Message at the New York Times – Blame the Victim
The day after the bloody rush hour bombing of bus #14a in downtown Jerusalem, the White House stated that the obstacle to Middle East peace was the terrorist group Hamas.
New York Times Refuses to Report the Straight Facts
Despite dramatic public exposure of the New York Times' questionable policies in handling repeated deceptions by one of its reporters, the newspaper has again misled its readers, this time about the terms of the "Road Map." Instead of reporting the actual terms of the peace plan drawn up by the "Quartet" (United States, the United Nations, the European Union and Russia), the Times has injected its own language.
Avoiding Armageddon (2003)
CNN founder and media mogul Ted Turner recently turned his interest to documentary film making. His company's first produc is an 8-hour series about weapons of mass destruction and terrorism hosted by the venerable elder statesman of TV news, Walter Cronkite."The New Face of Terrorism: Upping the Ante" is the third film in the series which aired on four consecutive nights in April 2003 on PBS.
New York Times Headline Writer Tosses Aside Impartiality
On March 25, 2003, the New York Times ran the following incendiary headline over an article by James Bennet:
Terry Gross’s “Tit-for-Tat” Interview with James Bennet
On March 12, 2003, NPR's “Fresh Air” broadcast an interview with host Terry Gross and New York Times Jerusalem bureau chief James Bennet. Among other things, Gross asked Bennet about Israel's anti-terrorist actions in Gaza–but she didn't term them anti-terrorist actions. Instead, she repeatedly referred to “tit-for-tat murders,” drawing a parallel between Hamas's terrorist attacks against Israeli children and the Israeli army's attempts to root out the killers.