Writers who use the op-ed section as a platform to comment on current events have the right to express opinions that go in any direction. But they don’t have the right to distort or misrepresent facts to make their points.
And that’s exactly what Chicago Tribune cartoonist Joe Fournier did on Tuesday in his outrageous “commentary” on the election of Benjamin Netanyahu. Referring to Netanyahu’s pre-election statement against the creation of a Palestinian state, Fournier showed a cartoon of Netanyahu “explaining” his rationale:
Come on, this is Bibi we’re talking about/The same Bibi who had the Israeli military repeatedly bomb Palestinian hospitals, mosques, and schools/Where exactly did you think I stood on a two-state solution?
So according to Fournier, Israel simply set its fearsome military on Palestinians for no reason, and with no objective other than to harm Palestinians. He ignores the thousands of rockets fired by Hamas and Israel’s duty to defend its citizens. He even ignores the fact that many of the rockets were fired from Palestinian population centers, leading to the Palestinian civilian casualties. Netanyahu didn’t bomb the Palestinians; he defended Israelis under Hamas attack.
The claim of bombing hospitals and schools is particularly ignorant. Reports have appeared for years pointing to Hamas leaders hiding in bunkers under Palestinian hospitals to exploit Israel’s refusal to harm the hospitals. During the 2014 Gaza war, Hamas used UN schools in Gaza to hide stores of rockets, according to story published by Fournier’s own Chicago Tribune.
Indeed, as far back as 2009, the New York Times reported on Hamas’s urban warfare tactics:
Hamas, with training from Iran and Hezbollah, has used the last two years to turn Gaza into a deadly maze of tunnels, booby traps and sophisticated roadside bombs. Weapons are hidden in mosques, schoolyards and civilian houses, and the leadership’s war room is a bunker beneath Gaza’s largest hospital, Israeli intelligence officials say.
Perhaps, the question Fournier should have asked is how, given the Hamas exploitation of hospitals, schools, and mosques, Israel could even consider a two-state solution.
When an HonestReporting reader contacted the Tribune to complain about the slanderous cartoon, the paper’s editors scrambled to justify it on the grounds that other features told a different story:
Thank you very much for your note. This is a response from our editorial page editor, Bruce Dold:
This was a blunt cartoon, clearly on one side of this debate. We regularly run opeds and editorials that support Israel’s right to defend itself, all with the goal of a full conversation on our commentary pages. Recent examples include strong opinions from Charles Krauthammer and Steve Lubet and a powerful commentary on anti-Semitism by Michael Douglas.
I’m making sure that Bruce is seeing all of these responses, so I assure you that your voice will be heard.
Thank you again for your note.
Sincerely,
Scott Kleinberg
Social Media Editor
Chicago Tribune
Apparently, the Tribune’s ignorance extends all the way to its editorial page editor, who believes that context-free accusations of this nature constitute “one side” of the argument and a legitimate part of the “full conversation.”
Actually, there is no place in the conversation for this sort of distortion. As Daniel Patrick Moynihan famously said, “You are entitled to your opinion. But you are not entitled to your own facts.”
[sc:graybox ]You can contact submit a letter to the Chicago Tribune’s Editorial Board at [email protected].
