NY Times Public Editor Weighs In on Coverage
New York Times Public Editor Arthur Brisbane’s column yesterday on the paper’s coverage of Arab-Israeli conflict, and criticism of the paper’s coverage, can be summed up: both sides complain, and our coverage is by and large fair. Brisbane asserts: “The complaints I get vary widely. Some are on substantive issues, but often they turn on the use of a phrase or a word, or placement in the paper.”
In a sampling of complaints he has received, Brisbane ignores the substantive issues that Times editors have failed to correct. Take, for instance, Ethan Bronner’s report that Israelis viewed Netanyahu’s trip to the United States as a failure, whereas polling data showed the opposite. Or Mahmoud Abbas’ falsehoods about his personal history and events in 1948. Or consider David Kirkpatrick‘s attribution of Egypt’s blockade of Gaza to Israel.
Furthermore, Brisbane is mute about the Times’ sustained downplaying of Palestinian genocidal incitement against Israelis and Jews. Perhaps because there is no comparable counter-example of an ongoing failure to report on an Israeli wrongdoing. It’s easier to chalk up the criticism of the paper’s coverage of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict to the “third rail” phenomenon — “touch it and burn” — than it is to expose, and correct, the paper’s systemic shortcomings.
(Hat tip: Stephen S.)
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