C-SPAN President’s CAMERA Shy Reaction
Susan Swain, C-SPAN’s president and co-chief executive officer, hosting a November 5 broadcast of Washington Journal, shied away from a CAMERA-related question at the end of a rare call aired (at 9:58 AM) containing historically valid points about the Israeli/Arab conflict. The caller, Craig of New York City, might have been motivated as a result of the plethora of unchallenged misinformation supplied on Journal broadcasts by anti-Israel, anti-Jewish callers. Craig said:
Hi, how are you doing? I just wanted to say –- to get to the root of the Arab-Israeli conflict, one has to look at the history, and you really have to go back to before 1948, you have to go back to the 1900s, when Jews were purchasing land from the wealthiest Arab families, such as the Nashashibis, the Husaynis and other wealthy families and you also have to look at the fact that [anti-Jewish] terrorism preceded [Israeli] occupation [of the West Bank and Gaza Strip]. There was no occupation in the 1950s, there was no occupation prior to that. Also, I was wondering if you had any comment to the recent reports on CAMERA.org …
Ms. Swain’s reaction to Craig’s comments and request is an implicit reminder of C-SPAN’s tendency to stonewall public complaints regarding its tolerance of bigoted callers who defame Israel and the Jewish people. Ms. Swain, seemingly tongue-tied, said:
Craig, uh…tu…tu…uh… We have about thirty seconds left and I will take a phone call from Indianapolis to wrap up the program.
(Hat tip: Jack Wolman)
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