Palestinians celebrate the release of mass murderers & their accomplices

Every now and again, I feel moved to send an email to Esther Enkins, editor in chief of the CBC, pointing out the CBC's bias or an error in their coverage of the Middle East. If you want to try it yourself, her email is esther.enkin@cbc.ca.

Here's an example...

Dear Ms. Enkins:

Re “Israel set to release final batch of prisoners in swap”
(http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/story/2011/12/18/israel-palestinians-prisoners.html)

and “Who gains from Israel's prisoner swap with Hamas?”
(http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/story/2011/10/17/f-vp-petricic-shalit.html)

I found that the text of both these articles met CBC’s usual high standards, but with this exception: The term "prisoner swap" is grossly misleading.

Gilad Schalit was a kidnapping victim held for ransom.

The Palestinians being released are convicted criminals. Indeed many of them were convicted of multiple murders.

An ill-informed person might say, but surely it's not “kidnapping” when it's an armed conflict situation and the person held for ransom is a soldier? But it is. The Geneva Convention expressly forbids hostage taking and gives soldiers the same protection as civilians. Such kidnappings are also forbidden by the UN’s 1979 International Convention Against the Taking of Hostages, which correctly refers to such acts by non-state actors as terrorism.

Of course no one expects Hamas to obey any laws, but Canadians should expect more of the CBC than to create a false equivalence between convicted criminals and a kidnapping victim.

This point is particularly important in regard to “Israel set to release final batch of prisoners in swap” which is illustrated by a work of Palestinian propaganda larger than the article itself. The image illustrates the released Palestinians as breaking free of their chains. Surely if the CBC gives such prominence to this image, you should also remind readers that these Palestinians aren't being justly liberated (as suggested by the image), but really are criminals being sprung from jail by the actions of other criminals.

Yours truly...

Since I complained, the CBC has updated the story and improved it, removing the Palestinian propaganda photo and adding a line that reads: "The prisoners freed in the first round included dozens of militants serving life sentences for involvement in bus bombings and other deadly attacks on Israeli civilians that killed hundreds."

However, the article still inaccurately refers to a "prisoner swap," rather than accurately identifying the Palestinians as convicted criminals freed in exchange for a kidnapping victim held hostage.

And the new photo for the article shows a released Palestinian prisoner joyously reaching out to embrace well-wishers. The photo conveys the message that this is a joyous occasion.  For balance, the story should include an equally large and emotional image conveying the reality of the situation; such as a photo of the terrrorists' burned and mutilated victims.

Alternatively, the photo used could just be given a more accurate caption: "Palestinians celebrate the release of mass murderers and their accomplices."

Radio Canada (the CBC in Quebec) chastised by Ombudsman for broadcasting Palestinian propaganda

Everyone interested in the issue has long recognized that the CBC is biased against Israel and in favour of the Palestinians. In English Canada, though, this bias has been less pronounced since Tony Burman, the former editor in chief, left the CBC to work for al-Jazeera, a network where Burman's bias is entirely at home.

Also, CBC journalists sometimes attempt to give even-handed reports on the middle east despite their bias. (Certainly the CBC does a better job of being even-handed than the Globe & Mail.)

But that's not the case in the CBC's French language service, Radio Canada, where anti-Israel reporting is simply the norm. Last summer, though, Radio Canada broadcast several reports that were so obviously and outrageously biased that the CBC's Ombudsman upheld a whole series of complaints. The Canadian Jewish News has the details....

Radio-Canada Ombudsman raps Middle East reporting
Janice Arnold

MONTREAL — The Radio-Canada ombudsman has upheld a series of complaints made by the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs (CIJA) about the network’s Middle East coverage.


Most of the complaints concerned reporting by the French-language public broadcaster’s Middle East correspondent, Ginette Lamarche, between June 5 and 7 on the deadly clash at the Syrian border between pro-Palestinian demonstrators and the Israeli army.

Ombudsman Pierre Tourangeau concluded that two reports by Lamarche did not respect the network’s standards for impartiality and accuracy.

Most significantly to CIJA, she failed to report that the Israeli army had issued several warnings before opening fire and that the demonstrators were violent and attempting to force their way across the Israeli border.

CIJA’s predecessor organization, the Quebec-Israel Committee, objected to Lamarche’s reference to the Qalandia checkpoint as a “symbol of [the Palestinians’] daily humiliation,” not making clear that the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine is also considered a terrorist organization, that Ahmad Saadate was convicted of ordering the murder of an Israeli government minister, and that some information was from a non-corroborated Syrian source.

CIJA also objected to Lamarche’s reference that the Palestinians “tried to claim their right of return.” The ombudsman agreed that this “right,” while central to the conflict, has not been confirmed by the United Nations Security Council.

“On an issue as controversial as that of Israeli-Palestinian relations, the choice of words, the precision of the information given and the identification of its source takes on particular importance,” wrote Tourangeau, who became ombudsman on Nov. 14, replacing Julie Miville-Duchêne, who left in July.

Even though some of Lamarche’s reporting was live, which made it more difficult for her to verify the information, the journalist is still obligated to ensure “in a reasonable manner” that it is accurate.

The ombudsman also agreed with CIJA that a June 7 broadcast entitled “Des Juifs du Golan appuient l’attaque d’Israël contre les manifestants pacifiques” (“Golan Jews support Israel’s attack on the peaceful demonstrators”) didn’t meet Radio-Canada’s standards.

Specifically, Lamarche paraphrased an Israeli, identified only as Maurice, as saying: “The army maybe shot live bullets on the civilians who were demonstrating peacefully. If that is the case, it is only doing its duty.”

An audio recording of her interview with the man showed that her paraphrasing was not faithful to what he actually said, Tourangeau wrote.

The ombudsman also found that “this morally questionable attitude” was presented without sufficient grounds as being representative of the Jews of the Golan.

Finally, the ombudsman concluded that RDI, Radio-Canada’s news speciality channel, used erroneous maps March 19 on the program 24 heures en 60 minutes to illustrate the Arab-Israeli conflict. CIJA had termed the maps “propagandist.”

The maps were used to show what a guest described as the loss of Palestinian land between 1945 and 2000.

Tourangeau describes the maps as “erroneous, confusing and incomplete, whose source was not identified.”

RDI’s management admitted that the maps should never have been used, while the ombudsman recommended that a correction be made.

http://www.cjnews.com/index.php?q=node/88925