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HR Prompts FT Correction on Israeli Politician

The Financial Times‘ coverage of the police recommendation to indict Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu on bribery charges included the following: Yoel Hasson, however, is not the “leader of the Zionist Union.” We contacted the FT…

Simon Plosker
December 3, 2018
12:00 am

Reading time: 2 minutes

The Financial Times‘ coverage of the police recommendation to indict Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu on bribery charges included the following:

Yoel Hasson, however, is not the “leader of the Zionist Union.”

We contacted the FT to point out that Hasson is a member of Tzipi Livni’s Hatnuah party, part of the Zionist Union. He also happens to be a deputy speaker of the Knesset.

While he is the Zionist Union’s faction head, this is a whip position, essentially the official whose task it is to ensure party discipline.

The FT promptly issued the following clarification at the end of the story:

While we commend the FT for quickly correcting the error (and unlike many other media outlets, acknowledging it), this isn’t the first time that the FT’s man in Jerusalem, Mehul Srivastava, has made a factual error when it comes to Israeli politics.

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Tags: distorted facts, Financial Times, FT, Hatnuah, Israeli politics, Knesset, Mehul Srivastava, success, Yoel Hasson, Zionist Union

Simon Plosker

With over two decades of experience in various non-governmental organizations in the UK and Israel, Simon Plosker returned to HonestReporting in October 2022 as Editorial Director having previously been part of the organization’s management team from 2005 to 2020. Prior to his first spell at HonestReporting, Simon worked in Israel for NGO Monitor, BICOM, and served for a short period in the IDF Spokesperson’s Unit. He was Managing Editor of the Geneva-based NGO United Nations Watch for two years before moving back to the frontline defending Israel from media bias. Simon has a BSoc.Sc in International Studies and Political Science from the University of Birmingham and an MSc in History of International Relations from the London School of Economics. He immigrated to Israel in 2001 from London.

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