Recent articles suggest the Washington Post is unfairly flagging Israeli “breaches” of the road map, while overlooking a more fundamental Palestinian violation.
The problem started off with Molly Moore’s coverage of an Israeli government report on settlements; in response to the Sasson Report, the cabinet voted to remove 24 settlements without specifying any time frame. Moore, however, reported the sequence of events out of order, implying Israeli foot-dragging on the issue.
The Post’s ombudsman, Michael Getler, addressed the point:
The critics compared Moore’s coverage unfavorably with that of the Associated Press and the New York Times, both of which reported that the cabinet affirmed it would dismantle 24 illegal West Bank settlements but did not say when that would happen. Moore’s story reversed the sequence in the lead, reporting that the cabinet delayed action while acknowledging that evacuation of these outposts is required. She didn’t use any numbers in the lead. I saw nothing wrong with this and Assistant Managing Editor David Hoffman points out that the cabinet statement doesn’t mention any specific number of settlements. He also notes that there is a dispute about the number of unauthorized outposts established since March 2001 that fall under this requirement; the Israeli Defense Forces says there are 24, the activist group Peace Now says 51, and a special investigator appointed by Prime Minister Ariel Sharon recently said there are 105 such outposts that should be dismantled regardless of when they were established.
The only flaw in Moore’s account, as I see it, is that the sole figure included is the one asserting that there are 105 such illegal settlements.
As David Gerstman notes, “So Moore’s story was accurate because it illustrated that Israel was in breach of the road map.”
Gerstman goes on to make a second, perhaps more significant point: the Post’s subsequent coverage of Mahmoud Abbas’s efforts for a Palestinian cease fire lacked important context. Moore wrote:
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas won pledges Thursday from Islamic militant organizations to extend the suspension of attacks on Israel until the end of this year if the lull in violence continues, but he failed to persuade them to agree to a formal cease-fire.
In an accord reached during three days of meetings outside Cairo, the Islamic Resistance Movement, or Hamas, and other Palestinian militant groups said their pledge not to resort to violence would depend on whether Israel honored its commitment to withdraw its troops from all Palestinian cities in the West Bank and release significant numbers of Palestinian prisoners.
But the bigger context ignored by the Post is that Abbas is courting the terror groups diplomatically because he simply has no clout to enforce a crackdown—even though the road map specifies that the first step has to be an “unconditional cessation of violence.” As Military Intelligence Director Aharon Zeevi Farkash told YNet readers:
He knows that he can’t begin the process from the end – namely to collect arms, arrest people and put them on trial. And so he has opted for a path of persuasion.
You must remember Abu Mazen has problems from within the Fatah ranks, and in fact faces several central oppositions: Hamas, which activates and ceases terror at will, and the opposition from within.
Therefore he has not started at the end but he has opted for the rout of calm and persuasion and so far Hamas is going along with him.
If he continues on this path and also brings to justice those who perpetuate terror, which he didn’t do with Islamic Jihad who claimed responsibility for the suicide bombing at the Tel Aviv nightclub, I believe there is a chance he would succeed in holding up. That is providing no large-scale terror act is carried out until July. Hamas also seeks calm, it senses it on the street and it supports it at present.
So the Post’s coverage effectively casts Israel as a road map violator needing to make concessions, while trivializing the PA’s inability to fulfill the road map’s most fundamental obligation.
