To: Brith Sholom Media Watch Subscribers
From: Jerry Verlin, Editor (jverlin1234@comcast.net)
Subj: Brith Sholom Media Watch Alert #650, 6/16/13
Calling All Josephs! Tell me the end of my dream beyond the point I always wake up in a sweat. My Time’s Come and I find myself fifth in the line to stand on a trap door and attempt to justify my existence. Those ahead of me:
“I never ate shrimp at home, only when I was out”
“I only ate shrimp in restaurants”
“I only ate shrimp in Chinese restaurants”
“I only ate shrimp in Chinese restaurants on Christmas”
Me: “I’ll take the Fifth on the shrimp, but I never profaned the names of Judea and Samaria when speaking with ordinary folks. I only called Judea and Samaria ‘The West Bank’ when speaking with Journalists”
This Week In The Inq: “W. Bank Settler Housing Will Grow”
The Inq ran an AP article Friday (Inq, Fri, 6/14/13, A5, AP), which it headlined: “W. Bank Settler Housing Will Grow.” This article’s loaded lexicon is, of course, one major imbalance, but its one-sided purveying of “Israeli settlement building” as what “lies at the heart of the impasse over restarting talks” is another. Let’s start with the latter.
#1: “Israeli settlement building lies at the heart of the impasse over restarting negotiations”
Paragraph 1 of this 9-paragraph article led that Israel “moving forward” with plans [initially approved last year and still requiring final approval – pars. 3 and 5] to build some 1,000 homes in “two small isolated Jewish settlements deep in the West Bank” caused Palestinian Arab officials to complain “Israel is undercutting U.S. peace efforts at a sensitive time.” Paragraph 2 said Israel’s announcement “drew swift U.S. condemnation.” Paragraphs 8 and 9 indirectly quoted Abbas advisor Shaath that “Israel’s latest move is a new sign of bad faith” and directly quoted him: “This Israeli government is destroying the two-state solution and the prospects of a peace deal in deeds and words.”
The balanced reporting flaw is not in the AP quoting Palestinian Arab officials blaming Israel building homes for Jews as “undercutting U.S. peace efforts” and “destroying the two-state solution” but in [1] the AP not balancing those Arab characterizations with U.S. and Israeli characterizations of what’s blocking peace talks and the ‘two-state solution,’ and [2] the AP exacerbating that imbalance by itself endorsing the Arab peace talks-impasse characterization in that very article.
AP paragraph 6:
Israeli settlement building lies at the heart of the impasse over restarting negotiations on the terms of a Palestinian state alongside Israel. Such talks broke down nearly five years ago, and Secretary of State John Kerry has shuttled between the two sides in recent months to bring them back to the table, so far to no avail.
First, as to what “lies at the heart of the impasse over restarting” talks, were AP news article readers not entitled to be told in this paragraph the reason why Kerry, who has “shuttled between the two sides in recent months to bring them back to the table, so far to no avail,” was not himself this very week in shuttlecock mode, but was back home in Washington? Here’s Israel Hayom’s headline and sub-head on Monday (6/10/13):
Kerry Delays Middle East Trip To Give Abbas More Time
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry was supposed to arrive in Israel on Tuesday, but trip has been delayed, likely to next week, as Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas decides whether to drop preconditions for talks with Israel.
Israel Hayom on Wednesday (6/12/13):
The U.S. is demanding that Abbas return to negotiations without preconditions, but Abbas has said that Israel must freeze all construction beyond the Green Line, including in Jerusalem, and ….
Israel is not willing to accept any Palestinian preconditions for the renewal of peace talks.
As for this Friday’s Inq’s AP article quoting an Abbas advisor that “this Israeli government is destroying the two-state solution,” sans AP inclusion of a rejoinder by Israel, this AP article might have quoted what Bibi said this week, as reported by Israel Hayom on Tuesday (6/11/13): “’The real question is whether or not there is a willingness on the other side to accept the Jewish state.’” We’ve repeatedly quoted in this media watch U.S. as well as Israeli officials defining the “two-state solution” as “two states for two peoples,” and we’ve quoted Abbas and others that “we will never accept this.”
Palestinian Media Watch headline on Monday: “Senior PA Official: All of Palestine – from the river to the sea – it’s all occupied.” Jerusalem Post on June 7: “Palestinians Campaign to Regain [sic] ‘Occupied’ Latrun” [the next-to-last place to give “back”]. To all of this add that Palestinian Arabs demand, as a pre-condition to talks, that Israel agree to the 1949 ceasefire lines as the basis for borders, as though the 1967 War and UN Resolution 242 never happened. Not to mention not budging on “the right of return.”
So how balanced was it for the AP to have quoted Arabs on Friday that Israel’s “moving forward” on building homes in two isolated “West Bank settlements” shows Israel “undercutting U.S. peace efforts,” Israel demonstrating “bad faith,” Israel “destroying the two-state solution and the prospects of a peace deal,” all without rejoinder from Israel, but endorsed by the AP’s own statement: “Israeli settlement building lies at the heart of the impasse over restarting negotiations on the terms of Palestinian state alongside Israel”?
#2: “West Bank … East Jerusalem … Jewish settlements … lands Israel captured in 1967”
The underlying premise of this and most other articles using the loaded terms “East Jerusalem,” “West Bank” and “Jewish settlements” is that “the Palestinians” are the unquestioned rightful owners of these places and that Jews are there as unlawful “occupiers.” The tipoff is the media’s characterization of the genesis of the Jewish connection: “… the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem, lands Israel captured in 1967,” AP in Inq Friday, 6/14/13, A5, par. 7. [Ok, the AP, Inq et ilk used to use the more sneering “seized.”] That Jewish connection goes back 3,000 years.
It’s time already for we Jews to admit that our eloquent legal argument that “East Jerusalem and West Bank Jewish settlements” are not “illegal” is not just a gratuitously uphill argument, but a gratuitously uphill argument that has convinced n-o-b-o-d-y. How many countries have their embassies in Jerusalem? How recently was it [it was last December, see BSMW #631] that three big non-Muslim countries on three different continents [India, Brazil and South Africa] jointly demanded
“not only must settlement construction be frozen, but that ‘settlements must be dismantled and the occupation end,’ not as a concession to be made in the course of negotiations,’ but rather as ‘an obligation under various (Security Council) resolutions and international law.’”
It’s time we – all supporters of Israel of both the right and the left – take on the lexicon that’s loaded against us, not accidentally loaded against us, but intentionally created and designed to delegitimize Jewish presence in Judea, Samaria and the heart of Jerusalem. We should never profane the names of Judea and Samaria as “the West Bank,” not even in Chinese restaurants on Christmas.
Regards,
Jerry