Despite the plethora of reports since then the CBC refuses to re-open the investigation.
Jack Nagler Director of Journalistic Public Accountability and Engagement at CBC News wrote in an email that "we should not ignore the human dimension altogether; we should report what both sides are saying." And the ombudsman added "nothing will change the
"experiences" of the reporters."
Their
experiences? I thought their job was to report facts and put events in context? And if experiences are now the new ethical norm, Stoffel and Hunter only gave us their "experiences" in Gaza but not Israel because they
chose not to be in Israel.
From the eyes of Hunter and Stoffel one would think Gaza was one great big tenement building. It isn't. The reporters didn't share the beaches, the
5 star hotelsand
hot spots where journalists from around the world stayed during the war. Nor did they share with us the experiences of women and children used as human shields or the fact that Hamas was holding media conference in hospitals and hiding rockets in homes, hospitals and schools.
Why did the CBC
choose not to be in Israel depriving Canadians the opportunity to
experience life in Israel during the war? Like the 24 hour fear from rocket fire by Hamas directed at Jewish, Christian and Muslim civilians. We didn't see the underground playgrounds that the Israeli children in the south have to use because there was only 15 seconds to get to the bomb shelter from an outdoor playground. Not enough time for so many young ones. We didn't see the
collection of rockets that are in Sderot, collected over more than a decade.
We didn't get to know Israeli families the way we got to know families in Gaza. I suppose if more Jewish children and died the CBC might have reported more from Israel. But rarely did the CBC put all this in context; that Israel spent billions protecting her citizens from attacks by the terrorist organization Hamas.
We didn't experience the panic in Israel when Hamas targeted the airport which led to its closure, potentially isolating Israel from the rest of the free world.
Canadians were left with the impression that Israel was the aggressor because the CBC
chose to report from Gaza, not Israel. In wars we are accustomed to seeing reporters embedded with those under attack. Would the CBC have spent more time reporting from Nazi Germany during WWII than with the Allies?
The reporting of CBC during the summer of 2014 is no different than biased reporting against the Jewish people over the decades. There is a history of willful blindness, for want of a better word, by journalists. Either that or it is ignorance, incompetence or
choosing to be anti-Israel.
In 1974, just months after the 1973 Yom Kippur war which the Arabs had initiated and then lost, Mike Wallace from CBS 60 Minutes went to Syria to meet with members of the Jewish community. The February 16 broadcast was filled with lies and half-truths. Wallace had declared that Kuneitra, in the Golan, had been destroyed, not by war, but by Israeli bulldozers in 1974.
This was a lie. Kuneitra had been partially destroyed in the wars of 1967 and 1973 and had been a ghost town.
Wallace presented the Jews in Syria, including the Nusseri family, as happy and well treated when in fact they were under terrible duress from torture and murder. They lied to protect their families. One can read about this in Joan Peters' book "From Time Immemorial." How is it that Wallace wasn't able to discern that? When the story was re-broadcast a few months later Wallace knew "two of the Nusseris' sons had fled Syria" and that members of the Nusseri family had been held for "interrogation" in a Syrian jail for more than a month." Yet he
chose not to share those details and instead reported that "Syrian President Hafez Assad had made a "calculated decision" to end the persecution of Syrian Jews."
On April 22, 2012 Bob Simon,
CBS 60 Minutes correspondent, took us to The Holy Land. He stated that Christians were leaving the holy land because of their poor treatment by Israel. Yet
facts show that Christians left Judea/Samaria because of the Muslims.
Simon specifically referred to the "wall [that] completely surrounds Bethlehem, turning the "little town" where Christ was born into what its residents call "an open air prison." He said this knowing it was a lie. Maps provided
Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the
United Nations,
B'tselem, and the
PLO all indicate that the security barrier is located to the north and west of the city, and doesn't completely surround Bethlehem.
http://www.camera.org/60minutes/
He glossed over the fact that the safety barrier was built in response to murderous suicide attacks against Israeli citizens coming from Judea/Samaria and that the barrier had reduced these attacks by 90%. In other words, he didn't put the barrier in context-
choosing instead to paint Israel as evil.
He
interviewed Christian families living in Muslim territories and assumed that they would tell the truth. It didn't occur to this seasoned investigative reporter that Christians living in a Muslim community would lie to protect themselves as had the Syrian Jews in 1974.
Did he think these people would behave any differently than the followers of Jesus who blamed the Jews for his crucifixion rather than the Romans amongst whom they lived and were ruled?
Simon should have had a better lay of the land. He was apparently unaware of Christian homes being
torched by Muslims, and incidents of abuse by an "Islamic fundamentalist mafia" against Palestinian Christians, who
accused the Palestinian Authority of doing nothing to stop the attacks.
Highly respected Arab journalist
Khaled Abu Toameh wrote "The Beleaguered Christians in Bethlehem," in 2009, a
piece published by the Gatestone Institute (when it was then called the Hudson Institute). He said that Christians have complained about acts "of intimidation, land theft by Muslims, especially those working for the Palestinian Authority." And if that wasn't enough, "several Christian women living in these areas have complained about verbal and sexual assaults by Muslim men."
Toameh also recounted hearing stories of shakedowns by Muslim gangs. He wrote:
"Over the past few years, a number of Christian businessmen told me that they were forced to shut down their businesses because they could no longer afford to pay "protection" money to local Muslim gangs.
He said this wasn't the story that Palestinian Christian leaders told to Westerners:
"When they go on the record, these leaders always insist that Israel and the occupation are the only reason behind the plight of their constituents. They stubbornly refuse to admit that many Christians are being targeted by Muslims. By not talking openly about the problem, the Christian leaders are encouraging the perpetrators to continue their harassment and assaults against Christian families. So many [are leaving], the Christian population there is down to less than two percent, and the prospect of holy sites, like Jerusalem and Bethlehem, without local Christians is looming as a real possibility."
Simon also
chose to interview Lutheran Pastor Mitri Raheb from Bethlehem whom he presented as a peacemaker despite the fact the Raheb
declared that King David and Jesus were authentic Bethlehemites while Prime Minister Netanyahu's ancestors were nothing more than eastern Europeans with no connection to the land. This is the same man who is "connected to a document -- '
Cairo Palestine' -- that defines Israel as an Apartheid state and calls for a boycott of Israel. It is an extremist and racist document which does not contribute to reconciliation and peace between the Palestinians and Israelis."
Why am I sharing this information with you? To show you that since 1973 (lists of dishonest reporting are available at the click of a mouse at Honest Reporting), Western media have demonstrated a callous disregard for truth when reporting on Israel. Despite complaints lodged against these news organizations, nothing changes. The media manage to justify their actions.
They
choose to vilify Israel and the Jewish people. Why?
