Brith Sholom Media Watch Alert #704, 6/29/14

To: Brith Sholom Media Watch Subscribers
From: Jerry Verlin, Editor (jverlin1234@verizon.net)
Subj: Brith Sholom Media Watch Alert #704, 6/29/14

This Week on Algemeiner: And Then There Were Three . . . .

Co-author Lee and I and – known to long-time BSMW readers – media-watching cohort and sometimes BSMW-contributor Deep Quote went out drinkin’ (to the extent a beer with dinner fills that description) with a seasoned practicing journalist this week. There aren’t many members of the Fourth Estate who’d knowingly do that with me (or I with them), so when our “lives-in-the-belly-of-the-beast,” as he puts it, friend gently compared the efficacy of our jousting with “West Bank” to that of jousting with windmills, we took it as a comment on tactics, not on what’s politically-correct terminology.

And yet even some of Israel’s otherwise most effective articulate advocates seem, inexplicably to me, to wear “West Bank” on their shoulder in making our Jewish homeland case to Western readers. And I recognize that many, if not most, of even You-Who-Put-Up-With-Me-Weekly take with a grain of salt my position that Job One is we ourselves ditching from our discourse the loaded lexicon of Jewish homeland-delegitimizing pejoratives – utterly and completely, all of it.

So I was pleased, to say no more, to see on algemeiner.com this week an article, “Israel is Engaged in a War of Words,” by a Ms. Epstein, an Israeli woman (with 12 kids) who claims that there are “a few diehards” like her (and Lee and me) out there in the wilderness who haven’t conceded that the word war is over. Go read her Algemeiner article (and, if you will, Lee’s and mine of the previous day on “Four Fundamental Facts” of the Arab-Jewish Palestine conflict.)

A couple gems of Ms. Epstein’s:

Left-wing journalists explain that “West Bank” is now the accepted term and tell me I’m being picayune, not to mention awkward, by insisting on A) Judea and Samaria, or B) The disputed territories.

One right-wing colleague tells me that by refusing to use the word “Palestinian” to describe the Arab population of Israel, I am a big turn-off to fence-sitters . . . .

Yet I am positive that the only way to win this war is to avoid the use of language that has been foisted upon us, language that is not only not descriptive of reality, but is loaded with skewed political sentiment. . . .

Facts become myths, myths become facts. The mainstream media adopts these terms, which are descriptive only of a false narrative and tell a lie.

The government of Australia could not have said it more clearly.

The Jews of the world ought to take cognizance.

These Past Two Weeks In The Inq: Mainstream Media Wordplay At Work

A dinnertime point of internal disagreement among our trio that dined with a real-life journalist this week was the media’s attitude in reporting on Israel. I subscribed to the view that these professional wordsmiths’ intentions are not as pure as the new-fallen snow. Taking these past two weeks in our hometown Philly Inquirer (“Inq”) as a test case, come take a look at three of its news articles (emphasis added throughout):

#1: “Israeli-American” not headlined like “Palestinian-American”; “the occupied West Bank,” not “disputed Judea-Samaria”: The Inq’s Sunday, 6/15/14 (A20), Washington Post article mentioned at the end of paragraph 3 that one of the three kidnapped Israeli kids “is a dual Israeli-American citizen.” The Inq’s headline omitted that: “Netanyahu: 3 Teens Kidnapped.”

Compare the Inq one year ago (4/18/13, A2), when it headlined as “Palestinian-American Teen Gets Two-Week Prison Term” an article that Israel gave two weeks of jail to an Arab youth regarding whom the “military said the youth threw rocks at vehicles on a highway and at Israeli forces on several occasions.” The Inq’s AP article led that the case “has drawn attention to Israel’s system of military detention of Palestinian minors.”

On that day [May 15, 2014], Palestinians marked the anniversary of their uprooting in the war over Israel’s 1948 creation …. (Inq, Wed, 5/21/14, A3, AP) (emphasis added)

*** Just one week before that, BSMW #698:

Palestinians marched in the West Bank and Gaza Strip to commemorate their displacement in the Mideast war over Israel’s 1948 creation. (Inq, Fri, 5/16/14, A4, AP) (emphasis added)

#2: Bibi and Kerry: “Terrorists”; LATimes and Inq: “Militants”; “Village” vs. “Settlement”: The body of the Inq’s Monday, 6/16/14 (A10) LA Times article directly quoted Netanyahu “Hamas terrorists carried out Thursday’s kidnapping of three Israeli teenagers,” and Kerry seeking details on “the parties responsible for this terrorist act” and “we reiterate our position that Hamas is a terrorist organization known for its attacks on innocent civilians and which has used kidnapping in the past,” but the article led with Israel “hoping to find three Jewish teenagers missing and presumed abducted by Palestinian militants.”

But the Inq has passed up better chances to call Arab attackers of Jewish civilians “terrorists.” E.g., in June 2002 when terrorists blew up Jerusalem buses two days in a row, murdering 25 and wounding 85 other Israelis, and said they weren’t done, the Inq headlined “… And Militants Promise More.”

And The Inq’s 6/16/14 photo caption: “Israeli soldiers search the West Bank village of Beit Einun, near Hebron. They were looking for three teenagers who went missing near a settlement.”

#3: Headlined contextless Israeli bombing of Syria “said to be retaliation”: The Inq’s Monday 6/23/14 (A10) AP article led: “Israeli warplanes bombed a series of targets inside Syria early Monday, the Israeli military said, in response to a cross-border attack that killed an [Arab] Israeli teenager the previous day.” [par.] “In all, Israel said it struck nine military targets inside Syria ….”

The Inq ran a 4-column contextless headline: “Israeli Military Planes Bomb Targets in Syria.” The far-smaller sub-head went on: “The attacks were said to be retaliation for an assault that killed an Israeli teenager.” A balanced headline would have led with the attack from Syria, not the Israeli response, and the sub-head (a) would not have called Israel’s response against military targets for an attack killing a kid “retaliation,” or (b) said Israel “said” it was in “retaliation,” or (c) used Israel “said” it was in “retaliation” to suggest that the Israeli “attacks” may have been unrelated Israeli “attacks.”

(The next day’s Inq’s front page Washington Post Syria-Iraq article led: “Syrian government aircraft bombed Sunni militant targets inside Iraq on Tuesday, further broadening the Middle Eastern crisis a day after Israeli warplanes and rockets struck targets inside Syria.” Nice of the Washington Post and Inq not to include in that “further broadening” of “the Middle East crisis” that the Israeli action was in response to an attack on Israel from Syria. Oh, yes, paragraph 15 (of 15) said the Israeli strike was “in retaliation.”)

Go back above and re-read that cogent quote of Ms. Epstein. Let there be no doubt in your mind that she’s right. Join us “diehards” in jettisoning the loaded lexicon of Jewish homeland delegitimization – all of it.

Regards,
Jerry