#826 – 10/30/16 This Week Not Just in the “Mainstream” Press: Pejoratives Prejudicing Perceptions of Jewish Presence in Judea-Samaria

 

WHILE YOU STAND ON ONE LEG:  The mayor of the Jewish town of Efrat [over the green line] invited Palestinian Arab neighbors into his sukkah, and some of them came.  The PA wasn’t pleased.  The mainstream media seized on the incident to contrast “Palestinian villages” versus “West Bank Jewish settlements.”  So nu?  But some Jewish newspapers also used some of these Judea-Samaria delegitimizing pejoratives.  Irrespective of one’s views on a “two-state solution,” we must all make the case to the world of the Jewish homeland claim to the land of Israel, including Judea-Samaria and [with due respect to UNESCO] historic Jerusalem.

This Week Not Just in the “Mainstream” Press:  Pejoratives Prejudicing Perceptions of Jewish Presence in Judea-Samaria

This week’s media watch begins with a three-paragraph AP squib – Inq-headlined

“West Bank:  Palestinians Seize 4 Over Settler Contacts”

– this week in the Philadelphia Inquirer (Inq, Mon, 10/24/16, A4), but it doesn’t end there.  Other newspapers, some of them Jewish, likewise used loaded terms in reporting the same incident, Arabs visiting a Sukkah in Efrat being arrested by their PA.  Championing non-pejorative-laced reporting on Israel begins with ourselves.

AP in the Philly Inquirer

Paragraph 1 of the Inq’s three-paragraph AP squib led:

“Four Palestinians have been detained for attending a Jewish holiday celebration in a West Bank settlement, according to Palestinian officials.”

Paragraph 2 directly quoted a Palestinian Authority official that “any Palestinian cooperation with settlers is viewed as violating the law.”  It was only paragraph 3 (of 3) that identified the site of this high crime as “Efrat, outside Jerusalem.”

The headline and lede sentence used “Palestinians … Palestinians … Palestinian” versus “settler” and “settlement,” and “West Bank” twice, but the Hebrew names of the region, “Judea-Samaria,” and place, “Efrat,” not at all.  “Palestinian” versus “settler” and “settlement” isn’t trivial in readers’ association of people and places in Palestine with perceptions of who belongs there versus outsiders.

But the AP’s is far from the most pejorative-laden reporting of this incident in Efrat this past week.

Washington Post

Here are some terms, in the order in which they appeared, in the Washington Post’s article, originally appearing Thursday, Oct. 20, and later amended:

“Jewish settlers and their Palestinian neighbors … the settlement of Efrat … the Israeli-occupied West Bank … a growing hilltop community that the United States considers illegitimate and an obstacle to peace … Palestinians from surrounding villages … a couple of dozen Palestinians … alongside 30 Israeli settlers … the Palestinians … the settlers … the neighboring Palestinian village … the settlement … the expansion of Jewish settlements in the West Bank, now home to 400,000 settlers … the village of Al Khader … cities and villages under the full control of the Palestinian Authority … Jewish settlers in the West Bank … the almost 50-year military occupation … neighboring Palestinian villages ….”

At the article’s foot:

“Correction:  An earlier version of this article incorrectly stated that the U.S. government considers the Jewish settlements in the West Bank illegal.  The Obama administration refers to them as ‘illegitimate’ and ‘an obstacle to peace.’  The international community calls them illegal.  Israel disputes this.”

For this correction, we can thank the indefatigable organization CAMERA:  “After Contact by CAMERA, The Washington Post Corrects on ‘Illegal’ Settlements”

New York Post

The New York Post’s Oct.24 editorial, “Why Palestinians Can’t Make Peace,” agreed with Efrat mayor Revivi’s statement: “It’s time the Palestinian Authority asks itself whether it would prefer to fan the flames of conflict instead of working to bring people together,” by adding “Long long past time, actually,” but the NY Post referenced, alas, the 1949 Israel-Jordan military ceasefire lines as “the 1967 borders.”  Even the good guys need a little pejorative-recognition help, now and again.

Now, let us look at how some Jewish news disseminators reported this incident:

Jerusalem Post

An article last Sunday, 10/23/16, “PA Detains Four Palestinians for Drinking Coffee with Settlers in Efrat Succa,” indirectly quoted the host of the gathering as explaining that

“he has worked to build bridges with the Palestinian villages around his settlement”

leaving it unclear whether it was the host or the Post that fails to see any imbalance in the characterization of respective adjacent Arab and Jewish residential places as “the Palestinian villages around his settlement.”  But see, or at least but cf, Arutz Sheva below, directly quoting the host, Efrat mayor Oded Revivi: “Yesterday we sat in the sukkah – Jews and Muslims” and “talked about common themes and our hope for a better neighborhood.”

Times of Israel

The Times of Israel’s October 20 article, “PA Intel Grills Palestinians Who Visited Settler Leader’s Sukkah,” likewise contrasted in its first two paragraphs “a West Bank settlement” with “two nearby Palestinian villages.”

Commentary

Jonathan Tobin of Commentary, one of the Good Guys, used a mixed bag of terms in his Oct. 25 article, “Why Punish Good Neighbors?”  On the one hand, he began by calling Efrat, “the city in the territories 12 miles from Jerusalem” [Wikipedia says 12 km, 7.5 m], and later “a town just south of Jerusalem,” both good, but then he added that that town’s in “the West Bank,” and later used another mixed bag, “Jewish communities in the West Bank,” and an all-bad “settlement blocs adjacent to the 1967 borders.”

Arutz Sheva

For an all-good, see Arutz Sheva’s Oct 21 article, “Palestinian Arabs Arrested for Visiting a Sukkah,” which twice referred to the Arab visitors to the sukkah as “Palestinian Arabs,” not “Palestinians,” referred to Efrat as “the town [not “settlement”] of Efrat,” and referred to those who sat in the sukkah as “Jews and Muslims,” not “settlers and Palestinian villagers,” and that they “talked about common themes and our hope for a better neighborhood.”

 

It should surprise no one that the mainstream media seized on Israeli Jews inviting Palestinian Arab Muslim neighbors into their sukkah, and the latter showing up (to the displeasure of the PA),  as an opportunity to contrast “Israeli settlements” versus “Palestinian villages,” etc, etc, but it ill-behooves newspapers belonging to a society that must make the case to the world that, irrespective of where final borders may lie, the Jewish people has a bona fide homeland claim to the Judea-Samaria area of the land of Israel, to contrast “Palestinian villages” with “West Bank Jewish settlements,” to refer to the exclusively-military 1949 Israel-Jordan ceasefire lines as internationally-agreed “1967 borders,” etc.

Rectifying this starts with such newspapers’ readers pointing this out.