Israel Daily News Stream 04/23/2012
April 23, 2012 16:23 by Pesach Benson
Everything you need to know about today’s media coverage of Israel and the Mideast.
60 Minutes looks at the status of Christians in the Holy Land. The Guardian issues a “correction” — for referring to Jerusalem as Israel’s capital. A UN document contradicts Ayatollah Khameini’s feigned fatwa against nuclear weapons.
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Israel and the Palestinians
• Further confirming why The Guardian won our 2011 Dishonest Reporting Award, the paper issued a ludicrous correction after a photo caption ran afoul of the paper’s groupthink and described Jerusalem as Israel’s capital.
The Guardian style guide states: “Jerusalem is not the capital of Israel; Tel Aviv is.”
• Bob Simon of 60 Minutes (video or transcript) visited Taybeh to look at the status of Christians in the Holy Land.
On top of that, there’s an issue with Ambassador Michael Oren’s involvement in the broadcast, as well as this statement on 60 Minutes Overtime. Natasha Mozgovaya of Haaretz points out that the balance Oren sought to address had to with the fact that many Christians won’t speak on-record about tensions with Muslim neighbors:
Before coming to Washington as a Haaretz correspondent, I used to visit Palestinian Christians in Bethlehem, Ramallah, the village of Taybeh and East Jerusalem. Some of the Palestinian specialists were happy to speak in Russian – they received their education in the Soviet Union. Nobody was happy about the security situation, especially during the Intifada years, or the Israeli occupation.
But many of them also had complaints about some of their Muslim neighbors. Some businessmen said they were forced out of business by local thugs. But they requested I keep that part off the record, out of concerned for the security of their families.
There was no big risk complaining about the Israeli occupation. Living in the shade of the security fence certainly feels bad, but as their fellow Christians living in neighboring countries could probably witness – on the record – it might not be the only reason behind the exodus. It might also be interesting to see how many Christians left since the establishment of the Palestinian Authority, since Hamas took over the Gaza Strip and since Israelis left certain areas.
It’s not easy for Palestinian Christians to tell Western journos about land theft, forced conversions, extortion and murder by Palestinian Muslims, but as one notable Wall St. Journal dispatch demonstrated in 2009, it is possible.
• In an analysis of the Eisner incident, the Jerusalem Post wonders if the IDF really understands the digital battlefield its facing.
• Maan News: Mahmoud Abbas is now giving Salam Fayyad the silent treatment after Fayyad refused to meet Benjamin Netanyahu. But it’s okay because Abbas also got a rare shout-out: from Shimon Peres. The Israeli president told Haaretz that Abbas is a partner for peace:
“I am aware that there are other opinions [about whether Abbas can or wants to make peace], but I don’t accept them, and I have a little experience,” Peres said . . .
m
7:08 pm
Apr 23, 2012
60 minutes is an anti Israel slice of excrement. What that piece of shit implied is that the plight of Christian palis is due to ISRAEL. This is utter tripe of course. The problem for ANY Christians OR Jews in the holy land is due to arab MUSLIM terrorists …. period.
What the wonderful 60 minute piece (of shit) managed to do was to OMIT the fact that if it were not SPECIFICALLY for Jews and Israel, there WOULD NOT BE ONE SHRED OF JUDAEO-CHRISTIAN PRESENCE IN THE ENTIRE REGION. – details, details.
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Anthony Dayton
8:33 pm
Apr 23, 2012
This is the letter I sent to 60 Minutes. I suggest that is where you want to post your thoughts:
There was nothing objective about Bob Simon’s piece on the reasons why Palestinians are leaving the Holy Land. The report mentions but heavily discounts that the wall and the circuitous trip to Jerusalem are the result of Israel defending itself from Palestinian, Muslim suicide bombers, finding only sympathy for the Palestinians who are affected. There was no mention of ambulances being used to transport both weapons and bombers, for example. In all of the West bank, Simon couldn’t find even one Christian who was mugged or threatened by a Muslim? Actually, perhaps he couldn’t because enough reports have shown that they are afraid of retribution, which Simon could have uncovered and reported had he chosen. Similarly, Simon interviews the Israeli ambassador, nicely skewering him. His distaste for the man is palpable right from the start. But a balanced report would have at least found and interviewed someone from the Palestinian government, asking why it is that Israel guarantees safety in all religious institutions, and why Christians are not fleeing from Israeli cities, or how he thinks the course of peace – so that the wall might one day come down – is served by airing TV shows that teach hatred of Israel to young, Muslim children, and perhaps Christian Arab children as well.
The Kairos document and the priest who authored it were likely incredibly influential in creating anger to Israel, to most anyone watching the segment. Here is a Christian priest himself who holds Israel responsible for his people’s problems. Surely it must be so. A real investigative reporter would have featured some of the content of the Kairos document, such as the part that spews hatred of Israel as being “evil,” and uses Palestinian terminology, accusing Israel of the Nachba and occupying, not the west bank, but all of the lands that are Israel. A balanced interview would have asked how someone who thought like that could be considered a valid interlocutor. Likely, a balanced episode wouldn’t have even interviewed and presented a Kairos priest.
If this was serious, objective journalism, a balanced report might have had as an expert guest, Raymond Ibrahim, a Christian scholar from the Middle East who writes constantly about the Muslim threat to Christians across the Middle East, including Palestine/West Bank. And I seriously recommend him to CBS and especially Bob Simon who should be forced to read and interview Mr. Ibrahim.
I’d also like to refer Mr. Simon and 60 Minutes to the following:
- Bethlehem’s Persecuted Christians at online.wsj.com
- More recently, Muslim Perecution of Christians at frontpagemag.com/2012
And finally, “Palestine: Muslim Persecution of Christians” on YouTube, submitted by CBN news. Anyone other than Mr. Simon would have to ask why a Christian news agency would report something like this on YouTube if the Kairos document were valid. It is the answer to Mr. Simon’s incredibly snide remark that Israel should remember that the United States, Israel’s supporter and benefactor, is a Christian nation, a not very subtly warning to Israel not to “piss off” Christians in the United States. Or else! What arrogance on his part, and by extension, 60 Minutes and CBS news, to speak for the American government and the entire Christian population. Well, the Christians at CBN think otherwise, and someone needs to have Mr. Simon and 60 Minutes watch their clip on YouTube.
These are just a few of the many items that give Mr. Simon’s report the Big Lie. 60 Minutes, you really need to keep him away from the Middle East, and for the sake of decency, honest journalism, and the well-being -never mind of Israel, but of those Christians Mr. Simon’s purports to care about, you need to revisit the topic on another episode, and air it before this piece of propaganda and hate becomes the WORD, because this segment was spoken by a false prophet.
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m
9:20 pm
Apr 23, 2012
Thanks for the info. I’ll check out the links.
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Ernest
1:06 am
Apr 24, 2012
Great Article. Well put, and very comprehensive. Takes all, or most, arguments, out
of those pro-Arab journalists’ sails. What I want to add and point out is the timing of this 60 minutes report: the purpose is to incite against Israel as many Christians as possible – Christians who usually vote Republican and have traditionally stood by Israel in good times and bad – in the run-up to the Presidential elections. Coincidence, oh Democratic-leaning media ? Coincidence, my foot.
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michael redhill
4:11 am
Apr 24, 2012
As a child I went to a Cattholic boarding school and have all my life lived among Christians. They have kept silent during these absurd attacks on Israel which is the ONLY country in the Middle East which doesnt persecute Christians . Their silence should make them ashamed of themselves. Perhaps it is because they have ‘form’ themselves.
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