The Jerusalem Post, among other news sources, published this story back in February, 2010: “NYT editor defends reporter’s Israel posting.” Then Tovah Lazaroff wrote,
Questions raised following report that Ethan Bronner’s son is in the IDF: Can a foreign correspondent cover the Israeli-Palestinian conflict if his son is an IDF soldier? The New York Times, in an opinion column on Saturday, answered “Yes” to that question when its executive editor Bill Keller defended the paper’s Jerusalem bureau chief Ethan Bronner, whose son is in the Israeli army.
Ethan Bronner not only has a son in the IDF, but he is married to an Israeli.
Is this Ethan Bronner’s son?
Who knows, but there is certainly the possibility that he is serving somewhere in the Palestinian territories in a similar role.
A few days ago, David Morris from US Media And Israel (.com) accused the New York Times of a cover-up that undoubtedly implicated Ethan Bronner, and put the Times on notice that its claim to unbiased reporting is bullshit beyond redemption.
Flotilla Cover-up: The New York Times Accused
June 28, 2010
For the past month, the alternative media have sought concrete evidence that the mainstream U.S. media, including the New York Times, willfully aided Israel’s cover-up of information about their Gaza flotilla attack. Prima facie evidence of their complicity is abundant.
The Times’ role in the cover-up ranged from suppression of facts and failure to follow leads that might (and did) contradict Israel’s version of the massacre, to serving as a shameless conduit for Israeli propaganda. The Times persisted in publishing and republishing the official line of Israel and became a virtual bulletin board for crackpot opinions and commentary. A prime example is Michael Oren’s “An Assault on Israel, Cloaked in Peace,” arguing delusionally that this humanitarian effort was an “act of aggression” that threatened the very nation of Israel.
The news we Americans received on the massacre seemed written by an Israeli propaganda minister — in fact, some of it was. The Israeli army generously provided our media with a carefully edited video of their attack, which major news outlets dutifully broadcast. Long-distance images of civilians defending themselves against commando killers (including a woman brandishing a deck chair) were presented as evidence of armed resistance. The imprisonment in Gaza of an Israeli soldier four years ago was cited as justification for executing nine peace activists, two shot in the back of the head at point-blank range.
Morris goes on to note alternative media journalists like Philip Weiss (Mondoweiss) and Glenn Greenwald (Salon) who have provided examples of the Times’ stonewalling and disinformation, like its failure to interview a single flotilla member. The May 31 Times repeated the Israeli line, that “Israeli officials said that international law allows for the capture of naval vessels in international waters,” giving Israel the apparent legal high ground, yet failed to consult experts in international law (one even wonders if it quoted Allen Dershowitz). At no point in its reporting did the Times lament the murder of nine peace activists or remark on the immense suffering caused by the illegal siege of Gaza. It rather featured a front page story on the public relations catastrophe the attack caused Israel.
The Times went even further in covering Israel’s ass. Isabel Kershner (quoting Morris again) wrote, “Israel says it allows enough basic supplies through crossings to prevent an acute humanitarian crisis.” Again, the paper reported this “cruel lie” citing only Israeli propaganda as their source (“Israel says…”), not the UN or human rights orgs like B’Tselem or Human Rights Watch, people observing on the ground.
No editor of the New York Times would allow such biased journalism unless directed to do so by top management. Who within the New York Times organization would order the dumping of journalistic integrity in order to conform itself to Israeli propaganda? The publisher/owner? When America’s most prestigious newspaper allows itself to spread Israeli propaganda and spin, it has broken ranks with responsible journalism.
“The Times must be truly embarrassed, even shamed of their employer’s willful deception of American readers (Morris).”
An Expert’s discusses capture at sea.
Apparently Israel is claiming that it was blockading an enemy power in Gaza as its excuse.
Ps I suggest you shorten your title to “NYT: a conduit for Israeli Propaganda” so people can comment.
Thanks for the tip.
Apparently Israel is claiming that it was blockading an enemy power in Gaza as its excuse.
This is nothing new. Israel has been claiming Gaza is an enemy state since the aftermath of the elections of 2006. This is a farcical claim, as Gaza has never exercised anything like functions of an independent state. It also reflects the current Israeli government’s apparent plan to eventually annex all of the West Bank, but not Gaza.
I’m slightly off topic again. Israel eases the blockade. Now Gazans can by more articles produced in Israel or imported by Israelis. It’s so practical, you see, Israel profits one way or the other. So where are Ms. Clinton en Mr. Obama on all of this? Nowhere. Profits are the just rewards of the Just. Why can’t Gaza inprot its own crap by sea? Stupid question! Why can’t Gazan entrepreneurs manufacture goods they can export to the world by sae? Why not? Because Israel and the U.S. say they can’t.
Your questions are food for thought. Why didn’t Israel jump when Obama condemned, sort of, the siege during his Cairo speech, and why did Netanyahu just ignore him?
Folks, Obama is just not in charge here. He is as Booman feared Netanyahu’s poodle. Let wait for tomorrow’s meeting to be over when they come out to greet the press. The same-old will prevail.
Of course, Israel has ALWAYS used the Occupied Territories as a captive market for Israeli goods, so it is hardly surprising to see them exploiting the blockade in the same way.
Israel is, perhaps, the last of the classical colonial (as opposed to the neocolonial) powers, and colonial powers have always exploited the colonized as markets for the colonial powers’ goods, as well as for the colonized territories’ resources (mainly water and very cheap labour in the case of the OPT).
The BBC did some actual reporting on this subject recently.
Now after posting this diary, which I believe has merit in its accusation of bias on the part of the NYT, I found this Op-Ed, in the NYT.
The Two Sides of a Barbed-Wire FenceBy
NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF
June 30, 2010
Strange, indeed.
I am not an optimist by nature, and yet it does appear that something major has changed in the last few years. I think Israel’s 2006 assault on Lebanon may have started some Americans’ thinking, and Gaza 2008-9 was a real wake-up call for many. I knew something was changing when during the Gaza massacre the mainstream American TV news were showing video of dead and wounded blonde, light-eyed Palestinian kids.
Of course the Congress and the White House and State Department did not waiver in their support of these actions on the usual garbage that “Isarel has a right to defend itself.” Israel is probably the only foreign country that gets legislation passed in the House and Senate defending it.
Anyone know what happened to the Goldstone Report? The UN posstponed action for six months, and then it disappeared from view.
Regarding the Goldstone Report, I think that was the plan!
Do you know what ‘Oy’ means?
Yep. :o}
Then no more need be said. Did you notice how uncomfortable Netanyahu was in Obama’s presence. Here I thought the ass kissing was going to go the other way.
Live and learn. What we don’t know. Or maybe not. Netanyahu will not reverse himself on the settlement freeze. That’s the only thing one can make of it, in my opinion, which may mean nothing at all.
Was it Maidmondes (sic) who said: once a Likud always a Likud?
I couldn’t watch – can’t stand the sight of that thug and cannot tolerate the sound of his voice either. Maybe I will find some videos to watch now, though.
On the other hand, Obama certainly said “all the right things” in typical U.S. President manner. In fact he said pretty much word for word what I predicted he would.
I think that it changed in 1990, and it took 20 years to take full effect.
What happened in 1990? The wall came down, and the Russian Jews came to Israel. In 1996, I was working on an international evaluation of psychiatrists, which included Israelis. The Israeli language for the material was Russian, not Hebrew.
So, when the Russians came, they came with the attitude of a people that had been thru pogrom after pogrom. They were not going to take shit from anyone, and they were going to be safe.
I think that is part of it.
Common ethnicity, culture and language, Russian, might explain why first generation Russian immigrants to Israel gravitate toward the right wing Yisrael Beiteinu party headed by Avigdor Lieberman, where they dominate. I suspect Russian rather than Hebrew is spoken in their communities and even inside political meetings.
Why this group turned out to be right wing and very anti-Arab (Palestinian) is beyond me, given the long history of anti-Semitism and exclusion in Russia.
I wonder what the atmosphere on college campuses is. I doubt that the Israelis are making friends. My daughter is very anti-Israel, as am I. Of course, she is studying Arabic, so this may be part of it (and will spend a semester in Cairo).
I hear of no one anymore going to the kibbutzes for a semester. Israel is not a place that anyone non-jewish would go now.
I would recommend Damascus over Cairo for a young woman studying Arabic. They have tons of foreigners there studying Arabic, and have a number of excellent programs. Cairo is a lively, exciting city to visit, but long-term it is very wearing. Damascus is cleaner, calmer, the air much cleaner, the people are very genuine, street theft is rare compared to Cairo, personal crime in general is very low, and the men tend to be more respectful of young women, so she is not likely to get hit on as much or as obnoxiously as in Cairo. I could even put her in touch with a lovely family that rents rooms in the Old City if she likes. She could visit Egypt from there if she wanted to.
Israel is not a place that many Jews would go either. More and more Jews are questioning whether Israel deserves their support, let alone their devotion.