A few days ago, the PLO warned foreign reporters not to use the name “Temple Mount” in reports about the Jerusalem holy site.
The thrust of its argument is that the Temple Mount is located in occupied territory, and any reference to the site other than the Noble Sanctuary (Haram al Sharif in Arabic) encroaches on Palestinian/Muslim claims.
The site is called the Temple Mount (Har HaBayit in Hebrew) because it’s where the Temples of Solomon and Herod stood. Jews (and Christians) have known the place by this name thousands of years before a green line was drawn through the holy city.
But the PLO now says “Temple Mount” is an inaccurate and politicized name.
So I have to wonder if this snippet by Reuters correspondent Jeffrey Heller is sucking up to the Palestinians, or just sloppy writing.
In light of the PLO’s warning to journos, my antennae are twitching:
The new bloodshed has been fuelled by tension over Israeli-controlled access to Jerusalem’s holiest site, revered by Muslims as Noble Sanctuary, where al-Aqsa mosque stands, and by Jews as the mount where biblical temples once stood.
If the foreign press is going to call the site by the English translation of its Arabic name, it should be using the English translation of its Hebrew name too. Don’t promote one name over the other. Referring exclusively to the Arab name, as the PLO seeks, creates a steady, drip drip effect diminishing Jewish ties to the holy site in the minds of uninformed readers.
And why refer to the mount as only Jerusalem‘s holiest site? It’s Judaism’s holiest site.
Besides the issue of misleading terminology, this raises a question of transparency: Did Heller make a decision to comply with the PLO warning? Was this snippet an attempt to finesse the issue?
We’re talking about Reuters, whose top executive, Stephen Jukes, coined the unfortunate cliche, “One man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter” after 9/11. It’s also the wire service that had a hissy-fit with CanWest in 2004 when the Canadian news chain added the word terror to Reuters copy. Reuters objected, saying the t-word would endanger its reporters. Bottom line: Reuters admitted appeasing terrorists.
Still, Reuters isn’t the only news service drawing scrutiny for unholy kow-towing to the PLO on the Temple Mount. In response to one AFP dispatch, Matthew Kalman tweeted tongue in cheek:
So, Jeffrey Heller, was this sloppy writing? Or are you allowing the PLO to dictate your work for Reuters?
Featured image CC BY-SA Wikimedia Commons/Andrew Shiva; Reuters Egg-sposed CC BY/SA HonestReporting.com
