Norwegian Media: Distorting the News
August 23, 2012 13:36 by GuestPostThe following guest post was written by Dr. Manfred Gerstenfeld, a member of the Board of the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, of which he has been chairman for twelve years, where he founded and directs the Center’s Post-Holocaust and Anti-Semitism program.
For a number of years, Norway has held the number one position on the Press Freedom Index. The perception that Norway has a free press is however largely false. Indeed, Norwegian authorities do not supervise or censure the media. Yet there is a strong anti-Israel slant and self-censorship among the editors of most media. The country shares a border with Russia. However, one often gets the impression that Israel appears in the Norwegian press more than its own powerful neighbor. Norway’s media are obsessed with Israel and many incite against it in various ways.
The aberrations of several leading Norwegian media often go beyond the usual bias of many other Western anti-Israel papers. They will readily report on issues in which they can blame Israel, but the numerous Palestinian crimes are often omitted or greatly under-reported. One usually searches in vain for articles about the Hamas party platform which mentions its intention to commit genocide of Jews. The same goes for the Palestinian Authority’s glorification of murderers of Jewish civilians. Frequent and transparent lies by Palestinian ministers, officials and media, rarely if ever get attention.
Norwegian media often looks away from the huge criminality and transgressions of humanitarian laws in the Arab and Muslim world. Mentioning that there is no other religion where murderous ideological criminality flourishes as much as in the Islamic world, is equally taboo.
Occasionally a positive article about Israel appears in one of the major papers. This was recently the case with an editorial in the third largest daily Dagbladet. It wondered about the lack of interest in Norway concerning Syria’s many war victims and contrasted it with a focus on Israel.
Were it not for a few brave people like the editors of the small Christian weekly Norge Idag and the leading Norwegian blog Document.no, Norwegians would not have any opportunity to read about how unbalanced the information on the Middle East is that they are being fed by the state-owned TV and radio station NRK and almost all media. The small Christian daily Dagen is equally courageous. It recently published an article of mine in which I explained why Labour Party Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg is a part time anti-Semite.
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Aug 23, 2012
[...] article can be viewed at Norwegian Media: Distorting the News on [...]
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rudebutcool
3:40 pm
Aug 23, 2012
Norway is a BIG HATE JEWS COUNTRY…I personally had a run in with some traveling Jewhaters in Thailand and was ready to kick their asses..girlfriend stepped in between…free press is anything but free…
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Check yoself
6:40 pm
Oct 11, 2012
The whole idea of free press is to never write anything bad about Israel. Spot on!
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Mark Feffer
3:48 pm
Aug 23, 2012
The Europans and Brit media who are so blatently anti Semetic and anti Israel are nothing but Accomplices to Murder.
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Steve
3:52 pm
Aug 23, 2012
Not sure why, but Scandinavia is a hotbed of antisemitism. Places like Malmo could only happen in places like Sweden: for now.
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Jan Freed
4:42 pm
Aug 23, 2012
Anti-Semitism is always in fashion. It’s the “little black dress”
of the self-righteous.
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Frank Adam
4:55 pm
Aug 23, 2012
Perhaps Norway is politically shielded by the Nazi occupation; by clever use of oil wealth as a civilised pretty country dealing with modern problems; and because they have not been in conflicts and associated scandals.
However Swedes and US Swedes in World War I were well pro -German for their historic and current problems with Russia. In WW II Sweden sold ball bearings and ball races to both sides.
Two: my history teacher was Britain’s expert on Norway and co-opted into the Foreign Office in WW II. He told us that when Quisling was shot the site had to be guarded to stop wreath layers. Across Europe there are still families that sided with the Nazis – not just as anti-Communists.
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Barry
5:38 pm
Aug 23, 2012
From the land that brought you Vidkun Quisling, & contributed more than 15,000 Norwegians volunteers for combat duty on the Nazi side, is one to expect complete surprise? This & the recent influx of Arab nationals to the area & you are guaranteed unsettling results. My hopes are that the good and decent Norwegians outnumber the ones that we are hearing of here. I am very hopeful due to the fact that in WW2 about half of Norway’s Jews were saved by the Norwegian underground. So I know there must be decent people there.
Perhaps the Norwegian media is simply following the lead of Israel’s own left leaning, “Israel bashing” media outlets. Either way, European antisemitism is alive & well.
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Thomas
9:57 pm
Aug 27, 2012
I speculate that the way that this strong Norwegian (and Scandinavian) anti-Israel bias find resonance among the general public has absolutely nothing to do with either Quisling or Nazi volunteers – but rather could be that a vast majority of the Scandinavian population (contrary to many other European populations) both sympathized and took lengthy steps to help the Jews during WW2 – giving and helping the weak are values very strongly connected to Scandinavians – and, exactly because of this sympathy and help – that Israel now holds an unforfilled greater moral responsibility and obligation in dealing with the Palestineans.
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Thomas
10:25 pm
Aug 27, 2012
Also, nowhere other than in Scandinavia will you find a people equally narcissistic and excessively preoccupated by identifying the politically correct opinion, in order to have a justified moral outrage.
And, if anything can sell a paper or move a voters vote, it is surely a moral outrage.
Finally – the true name of the game is really not media bias, but straight up propaganda. On both sides. And if there is anything that good propaganda can do, it is removing the focus from what is important (to recognize that we are all born on the same earth and need to coexist) by preoccupying us with differences for us to discuss, while someone else can quietly carry on their power game.
Peace.
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Leigh Halprin
5:56 pm
Aug 23, 2012
http://www.winnipegjewishreview.com/article_detail.cfm?id=1424&sec=6
Canada, Norway and Antisemitism?
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Revolutionary Guards Ordered to Intensify Terror Against West | Blogs about Israel aggregation
7:58 pm
Aug 23, 2012
[...] In an exclusive guest post for HonestReporting, Dr. Manfred Gerstenfeld discusses the Norwegian media’s distorted Mideast [...]
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iris claire blutreich
10:14 pm
Aug 23, 2012
It is sad that Norway which suffered during world war 2, should have an anitsemitic press that spreads government supported hatred. What does that say to me? Put your trust in no man. Arm yourself well and be most ready. The land that produced Grieg, also produces mean lies about the children of Israel.Pray for strength.
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Carol
11:12 pm
Aug 23, 2012
I simply don’t understand distorting the the NEWS all it causes are problems in the population it simply makes no sense to me at all and t that is a fact.
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Jake Viitanen
9:14 am
Aug 24, 2012
When Anders Breivik attacked and killed those youngsters in Utoya islad, just outside Oslo,one could ask what were they doing there?
They were on a summercamp arranged by the Social democratic party AND they were learning and planning how to boycott Israel.
In fact, the norwegian prime minister had earlier visited the camp and told the young people how proud he was of them when they were showing their solidarity to Palestine with big placard that said: Boycott Israel !
And little after a majority of them were shot to dead!
Somehow one should be able to link together realities of two dimensions: material and spiritual.
God in Heaven is not agreeing with people who are planning to destroy The Apple of His eye, Israel, in any way.
What Mr. Breivik did was horrible. And what these young socialdemocrats did to Israel was as well horrible, even if they didn’t understand the horrible in their acts against Israel and God.
You can always speculate things with other people, but with God it’s a different story. Either you get it or not.
Now a whole generation of Socialdemocrats are gone. But did you ever asked yourself why?
For me it’s encouraging to know that despite everything a man has ever acheeved in science,medicin, tecnology etc. there’s still a God in Heaven who is sovereign in every way and He is not asking our opinion on things He is doing.
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Kenneth
10:37 am
Aug 24, 2012
Well said! I agree.
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Fredagsblandning | Kim Milrell.com
9:33 am
Aug 24, 2012
[...] sorgligt men intressant: Norwegian Media: Distorting the News. Kolla även (och bokmärk) denna fiffiga site: Norway, Israel and the [...]
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Kenneth
10:55 am
Aug 24, 2012
I guess it’s not only the Norwegian, but all big Scandinavian medias that are distorting the news about Israel. In Sweden Aftonbladet, Expressen, Dagens Nyheter, Svenska Dagbladet, TV4 and SVT are one sided and always pointing their finger at Israel as the bad guy.
In Finland Iltalehti, Ilta-Sanomat, Helsingin Sanomat, Aamulehti, and especially YLE, are doing the same.
In Denmark at least DRK, Al Qamar (http://alqamar.info/news/) and a bunch of smaller medias are distorting the news about Israel. But Denmark is the only country in Scandinavia, where the parliament has come out with a declaration that the country is and will also in the future be built on Christian values.
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Norwegian Media: Distorting the News | The Conservative Papers
12:23 pm
Aug 24, 2012
[...] Click here to continue this article on Page 2 VN:F [1.9.20_1166]calculating…Rating: 0.0/10 (0 votes cast)topsyWidgetPreload({ "url": "http%3A%2F%2Fconservativepapers.com%2Fnews%2F2012%2F08%2F24%2Fnorwegian-media-distorting-the-news%2F", "shorturl": "http://bit.ly/OdgTCD", "style": "big", "title": "Norwegian Media: Distorting the News #Freedom #Hamas #HonestReporting #Islam #Israel #Jihad #Norway #Palestinians #Terrorism" }); [...]
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norwegianguy
12:38 pm
Aug 24, 2012
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Brent Pudsey
1:58 pm
Aug 24, 2012
This is an interesting article and comments from others have brought an important question to the forefront of this debate. The question is whether the media truly represents the view of the overall general public? The media is defenitely anti Israel but the people themselves might not be. However that being said Norway and other Scandanavian nations are showing their intolerance of Israel.
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wayne
7:20 pm
Aug 24, 2012
Mr Gerstenfeld: knowing what you know about the lack of integrity in the Norwegian news media, why are you not carrying and using your own recording device for such events as the Wold interview? What percentage of Ms. Wolds undisprovable lies are attributable to your own neglegence?
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oldschooltwentysix
8:14 pm
Aug 24, 2012
The echo chamber of the Norwegian elite creates a work product that is average, at best, yet an internal consensus that it is cutting edge.
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Mr. Light-Bright
6:36 am
Aug 26, 2012
Honest Reporting, page quote: “Instead of interviewing me anew, she fabricated a false interview.”
What theological, or philosophical view does one take to lie in such a way? Certainly not one to hold morality accountable.
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