Fix It Fox!
May 25, 2011 14:51 by Simon Plosker
Even the most well-meaning of journalists can get confused by the Arab-Israeli conflict’s complexities and historical details.
A case in point is Fox News’ Leland Vittert, who does an otherwise excellent job explaining the practical realities that any Israeli prime minister would face in the event of a complete Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank.
However, Vittert’s final paragraphs demonstrate some basic errors and misinterpretations:
And the second major problem inherent with the ’67 border requirement: the entire Old City, including the most holy site in the Jewish religion, the Wailing Wall, sits on the other side of that border.
Both the Palestinians and Israelis claim Jerusalem as their capital and the Wailing Wall is on the Palestinian side of the “Green Line,” which is diplomatic speak for the border before the Six-Day War broke out in 1967.
In any final status agreement, both sides would have to agree about what to do with Jerusalem and the holy sites of both religions, which has proved thus far to be an uphill battle, with the Israelis demanding a undivided capital and the Palestinians refusing to make a deal without large parts of the Old City and East Jerusalem.
A number of problems:
- Vittert refers to the 67 “border”. While it may appear to be a minor point, this reference to what is actually the 1949 armistice or ceasefire lines is critical when defining the status of these lines. A border is a legally defined frontier that implies some sort of permanence. In this case, it is crucial to point out in any negotiations that the lines that Vittert refers to were never a real border with some historical or legal status.
- The “Wailing Wall” should be correctly referred to as the “Western Wall” and it is certainly not the holiest site in the Jewish religion. The holiest site is, of course, the Temple Mount.
- Vittert states that both Israelis and Palestinians claim Jerusalem as their capital, thus placing equal weight behind both “claims”. In reality, Jerusalem has only ever been divided for 19 years between 1948 and 1967 when it was under Jordanian rather than Palestinian control. Jerusalem has always been the Jewish capital and center of Jewish life for 3500 years. It has never been an Arab capital even when under Jordanian control.
Please send your considered comments to Fox News – newsmanager@foxnews.com – to send your appreciation to Leland Vittert but also to draw his attention to the above errors in his article.
For more on the issue of Jerusalem, see our video “Jerusalem – The Media Myth of Two Cities“, join our Facebook page “The History of Jerusalem Did Not Start in 1967” and check out our Hot Topics: Status of Jerusalem page for more resources.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JXSvrAe5xEM&[/youtube]
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David Berger
5:24 pm
May 25, 2011
I am a fervent suppporter of Honest Rerprting and its work, but this complaint strikes me as foolish and self-defeating. You lose credibility when you lodge formal complaints about assertions that are essentially true. You can and even should send a message to media outlets making these points, and you can initiate op-ed articles and press releases that make them. But to put this in the context of a complaint–however mildly worded–brands supporters of Israel as nitpickers who will never be satisfied with anything. Wailing Wall was once a widely used term; western wall is far better, but the former is not an error. Both sides do claim Jerusalem as their capital. And to encourage mass emails criticizing a friendly journalist for saying borders is simply a bad idea. HR can write him a friendly message making the point.
David Berger
Dean, Bernard Revel Graduate School, Yeshiva University
Hot debate. What do you think?
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Aaron Phillips
5:47 pm
May 25, 2011
To allow the term “’67 border,” which is in fact cease a fire or armistice line, to go unchallenged is to not appreciate how the Arabs and the anti-Israel clique will gloom on to this language and will insist that the ’67 border is in fact an actual border and not something to be negotiated. Wait and see what happens in the debate in the U.N. Among other things, the conflict between Israel and the Arabs is a war of words and so far the non-Arab world has been losing that war. That is why Honest Reporting is so important in this fight.
Well-loved. Agree or Disagree:
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Trisha
2:13 pm
May 26, 2011
As a daily watcher of FOX news,I was FURIOUS at Sunday’s interview of Herman Cain by Chris Wallace.
Beside other things that Chris did to put Herman on the spot,he said the “Palestinians” were THROWN OUT in 1948″!This is PROPAGANDA,that he may just be re-gurgitating but he is a reporter & responsibile to KNOW HIS FACTS!!!
As WE all know, the ARABS were told to GET OUT because the other countries were going to attack & slaughter everything that moved…& I don’t even HAVE a show on a MAJOR network!!!
Well-loved. Agree or Disagree:
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anonymous
9:45 am
Jun 22, 2011
Why are we even calling the armistice line the “1967 borders”? To me, the “1967 borders” includes the Sinai Peninsula, as well as modern-day Israel, including Judea & Samaria, Gaza, and parts of the Golan Heights and South Lebanon that were previously “occupied” by Israel after the wars of 1967 and 1973. I DON’T think these countries WANT a return to the 1967 borders! Moreover, with all the talk of Israel and apartheid, isn’t JORDAN the apartheid state? More than half their population is “Palestinian”, yet they are ‘less than equal’ to the Hashemites.
Agree or Disagree:
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