It took no time at all for the mainstream media to transform the tragic events in Charlottesville, VA — or rather the reaction to them — into a cudgel with which to beat Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu.

Does Netanyahu support white supremacists and neo-Nazis? Of course not.

Did he condemn them? Yes, below is his tweet from the Prime Minister’s office.

So what has spawned all these articles critical of Netanyahu? Obviously, it does not take much to trigger articles condemning Netanyahu, but let’s take a look at the specific criticism.

(more…)

Iranian lawmakers voted to increase military spending, while chanting “Death to America,” on Aug. 13, 2017. Many major U.S. news outlets ignored the event, while others offered incomplete reporting.

Iran’s parliament voted to increase funding for the country’s ballistic missile program and what The New York Times called “foreign operations by the Revolutionary Guards (“Iranian Parliament, Facing U.S. Sanctions, Votes to Raise Military Spending,” Aug. 13, 2017).”

Citing Iran’s state media, Times reporter Thomas Erdbrink said that Tehran would spend $260 million on its ballistic missile program and “around $300 million on activities by the Quds brigade, the international arm of the Revolutionary Guards Corps.” Additional funds, approximately more than $200 million, “will go to other defense and intelligence projects.”

Ali Larijiani, the speaker of the parliament, described the legislation as a “first step,” The Times reported. Out of 247 legislators present, all but seven voted for the bill.

As CAMERA has noted, the U.S. State Department has designated Tehran as the leading state sponsor of terrorism. The parliament, which has erroneously been described by some media outlets as containing “moderates,” is largely a rubber stamp for the theocratic dictatorship led by Ayatollah Ali Khamenei (“The Media and the Myth of the Moderate Mullahs,” March 2, 2016).

The Times’ report omitted key information about Iran. The dispatch failed to mention that the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps is actively involved in training U.S.-designated terrorist groups, including Hezbollah. As CAMERA has highlighted, the IRGC is supporting Popular Mobilization Units (PMUs) who are threatening U.S. troops and committing atrocities in Iraq and Syria (“Politico Whitewashes Iranian Militias,” April 20, 2017). Instead, reporter Erdbrink simply stated that the IRGC is “advising Iraq and Syria.”

The paper also treated Iranian claims with an uncritical eye. For example, it quoted the regimes’ assertions that “Iran says it does not want to make nuclear warheads, something the International Atomic Energy Agency verified during continuing inspections.” Yet, The Times failed to note that in every single instance in which an ICBM program was launched it was accompanied by an attempt to attach a nuclear payload to it. Similarly, the paper failed to note that the IAEA is only allowed access to sites that the Iranian government has “declared (“Iran deal limits inspectors’ access to suspicious sites,” Bipartisan Policy Center, July 17, 2015).”

Indeed, on the same day that Erdbrink filed his dispatch, the deputy chief of the IRGC, Hossein Salami, rejected U.S. demands to inspect Iranian military sites, stating “we’ll not let them even watch the doors of the sites.” In a November 2016 speech covered by the Iranian state media that Erdbrink cites, Salami proclaimed that Iran is able to target the U.S. “anywhere in the world.”

The Times failed to cover Salami’s remarks. It also treated as credible Iranian claims that pressure from the Trump administration—specifically the passage of recent U.S. sanctions aimed at Tehran—was responsible for the military increase. However, as CAMERA highlighted in January 2017, Iran voted on Jan. 9, 2017 to “expand military spending”—eleven days before Donald Trump was sworn in as President. That is: Iran was increasing military spending before U.S. sanctions were increased—a key fact omitted by the paper.

Major U.S. news outlets largely ignored that earlier increase, including Politico, The Baltimore Sun and USA Today, among others. And yet again, all three outlets omitted Iran’s recent defense appropriation.

The Washington Post continues to neglect internal Palestinian affairs. Six-months after he was appointed deputy to Fatah head and Palestinian Authority (PA) President Mahmoud Abbas, a man named Mahmoud al-Aloul has yet to be featured in the pages of The Post. Fatah is the dominant movement in the PA, which rules the West Bank (Judea and Samaria).

As CAMERA has noted, al-Aloul is a convicted and unrepentant terrorist who goes by the nom de guerre Abu Jihad (“Father of Jihad”). Since his appointment in February 2017, al-Aloul is potentially in line to succeed Abbas—an ailing octogenarian autocrat who leads entities that receive considerable U.S. and international aid. His ascension should be a news story—particularly given The Post’s frequent coverage of the future of the “peace process” with Israel and recent U.S. congressional efforts aimed at addressing PA payments to terrorists (for more details, see here).

The United States, Israel and others could potentially be looking at the day in which a man named Abu Jihad leads the Palestinian Authority. Indeed, Abbas’ decision to activate the Tanzim faction of Fatah during the latest Temple Mount dispute, led to analyst Grant Rumley proclaiming that “the end of the Abbas era” might be here.

In a Feb. 24 2017 Algemeiner Op-Ed entitled “Terrorist Appointed as Mahmoud Abbas’ Deputy, But the World Stays Silent,” CAMERA pointed out the lack of media attention that Abu Jihad’s appointment was receiving. In conversations with Post staff, and in several Op-Eds since then, CAMERA highlighted the importance of the media devoting attention to Palestinian political developments commensurate with their attention to Israeli affairs.

Yet, six months later, The Washington Post has yet to note Abu Jihad’s rise. Instead, The Post’s Jerusalem bureau has filed dispatches on Palestinian pigeon ownership (“An old pastime thrives in a Palestinian enclave,” Aug. 13, 2017), a Palestinian winning an ‘Arab Idol’ song contest (Feb. 26, 2017) and the Palestinian used car market (“How junkyard cars from Israel have become deadly Palestinian treasures,” March 29, 2017)—along with numerous reports on Israeli political developments and the future of the peace process.

Abu Jihad, however, is still missing in the paper’s pages. And it’s not as if the paper is unaware of who he is.

A March 15, 2011 Post dispatch (“Palestinians rally for unity in Gaza, West Bank”) described a gathering in which “Mahmoud al-Aloul, a senior Fatah official, threw his arm around Hussein Abu Kweik, a Hamas leader, in a show of brotherhood.” An Aug. 23, 2013 report by Jerusalem bureau chief William Booth even uncritically quoted Abu Jihad’s claims that Israelis “do not want a peace process.” The paper, describing al-Aloul as “the former governor of Nablus district,” omitted his record as a convicted terrorist. (“Fatal West Bank clash threatens peace talks, Palestinians say”).

Yet, now that al-Aloul has risen in Palestinian politics, The Post has nothing to say. By contrast, Israeli affairs are covered extensively, with reports about who the Israeli prime minister’s dog is biting at a dinner party, an Israeli restaurant purportedly overcharging tourists, and politicians like Naftali Bennett being profiled.

Bennett, The Post tells readers, is “hardline.” Fatah’s deputy head, Abu Jihad, however, is nowhere to be found.

C-SPAN’s Washington Journal daily three-hour morning call-in show uses a revolving roster of approximately 10 hosts often guilty of journalistic malpractice when Israel or Jews is mentioned. Host Paul Orgel is a prime example.

On Aug.7, 2017 at 9:34 a.m. (Eastern), Orgel, during a segment soliciting viewers’ comments on news of the day, fielded a lunatic fringe call from “Mitch from Memphis, Tennessee”:

I have a comment on your recent [previous segment] guest. Since all wars are bankers’ wars, all you have you to do is turn down the TV and watch the guy’s eyes to tell that he’s lying and he was squirming around on some of the calls. So, when ISIS – which also stands for ‘Israeli Secret Intelligence Service’ [Sic. No such entity exists] is what it really should be spelled out as – attacks Tel Aviv, the Vatican, or Washington D.C., that’s when you’ll know it’s real and not ‘green screen terrorism’ [fake terrorism]. And the only reason they are talking about North Korea is because that war never actually ended. And that is the only card they have left to play where they don’t have to go to Congress and declare war. That is why they are pumping that up. That is all I have to say.

Orgel replied, “Thanks for calling, Mitch. Sherry, calling from Florida …”

The previous segment referred to by caller “Mitch from Memphis” was “The cost of combating ISIS [Islamic State terrorist entity].” The guest (insulted by Mitch) is Charles Johnson, managing director of international affairs and trade issues at the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO).

Thus, Orgel, thanking the lunatic fringe caller, characteristically failed to even comment on a defamatory anti-Israel charge and an anti-Jewish canard (“all wars are bankers’ wars”).

In a previous instance of host Orgel’s frequent unprofessional performance (at least as it pertains to Israel or Jews) as Washington Journal host, he indulged a lunatic fringe caller’s identical inflammatory views defaming Israel twice only 22 hours apart in January 2010. The caller used two different names and claimed two separate (distant) locations, saying virtually the same thing each time and in the same distinctive voice. Orgel indulged “Janet from Birmingham, Alabama” on January 1, 2010 at 9:51 AM and then (the same individual again) on January 2 at 7:50 AM indulging “Carol from Scottsville, Arizona.”

Some previous Orgel examples are Dec. 26, 2016 (morning calls at 7:17, 8:54, 9:03) and Nov. 15, 2015 (calls at 7:07, 7:29, 7:40, 7:56).

Meanwhile, the news media fails to expose C-SPAN’s transgressions misleading potentially millions of viewers.

A Washington Post report on a California imam’s calls to “annihilate” Jews minimized and obfuscated the cleric’s comments and overt antisemitism (“California imam apologizes for sermon seen as inciting to Jews, condemns antisemitism”).

As CAMERA has noted, on July 21, 2017 Imam Ammar Shahin delivered a sermon at the Islamic Center of Davis. Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI), a non-profit organization that monitors and translates Arab, Iranian and Russian media, translated the Shahin’s remarks—after it was first posted on the mosque’s website.

MEMRI highlighted that the imam called to “liberate the al-Aqsa mosque from the filth of the Jews,” and to “count them one by one and annihilate them down to the very last one,” among other statements. The imam’s exhortations happened after Palestinian violence against Jews occurred after Israel discussed increased security measures at the Temple Mount, Judaism’s holiest site, following a July 14, 2017 terror attack. During that attack, three Arab-Israeli citizens murdered two Israeli Druze police officers with weapons hidden in the al-Aqsa mosque that sits near the Temple Mount.

Major U.S. news outlets ignored the story. Writing at Legal Insurrection, a conservative blog that often focuses on the Middle East, antisemitism and other matters, David Gerstman noted that The Washington Post failed to report the imam’s comments until July 28, 2017—fully a week later and only after the mosque issued a non-apology apology that CAMERA termed “insulting (for more, see “Insulting Apology from Islamic Center of Davis”).”

Post reporter Michelle Boorstein noted that Shahin’s “widely distributed sermon about Jews in Jerusalem set off controversy and fear of violence.” Boorstein minimized Shahin’s call for anti-Jewish violence, claiming that the sermon merely “called [for] Muslims to come together to protest the closure” at the al-Aqsa mosque” and “prayer for God to destroy Muslims’ opponents at the site.”

Boorstein failed to report an earlier July 14, 2017 sermon in which Shahin called to turn “Jerusalem and Palestine into a graveyard for the Jews.”

Making matters worse, the reporter also sought to impugn MEMRI, implicitly questioning its translation and its motivations. Boorstein claimed that MEMRI monitors media coverage, “particularly about Israel,” which, as noted above, is false. The Post correspondent also uncritically quoted the mosque’s statement, which falsely claimed that MEMRI had “cut and past” the imam’s remarks.

Boorstein even quoted Nazir Harb Michel, a senior fellow at Georgetown University’s Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding, who provided a whitewashed translation of Shahin’s sermon. Michel, without evidence, “expressed concern that MEMRI was hoping to stir up anti-Muslim sentiment…”

In fact, Shahin was advancing, not just anti-Jewish sentiment, but condoning and encouraging anti-Jewish violence. As CAMERA pointed out to in correspondence to the Post reporter, the cleric was making use of the “al-Aqsa libel”; the false claim that Jews are seeking to destroy or defile the al-Aqsa mosque. Palestinian Arab leaders have often employed this lie to provoke anti-Jewish violence (see, for example “The Battle over Jerusalem and the Temple Mount,” CAMERA, July 24, 2017).

The Post also failed to note that the imam was wearing a scarf that bears a resemblance to a scarf distributed by the Fatah movement during the recent crisis over the Temple Mount. As Mordechai Kedar, an Israeli specialist on Islam has noted, the scarf has emblazoned on it the words, “Jerusalem is ours.”

Contra to The Post’s headline, the sermon was not merely “seen as inciting to Jews,” it was an impassioned call for violence against Jews. And contra to The Post’s attempt to muddy the waters, the meaning of “annihilate” the “Jews” is clear in any language.

In a series of captions earlier this week regarding the observance of Tisha B’Av, a Jewish day of mourning marking the destruction of the First and Second Temples as well as other catastrophes that fell on that day, Agence France Presse errs on the Western Wall, wrongly identifying it as “the last remaining vestige of the Second Temple.” Examples of the erroneous captions follow:

The Western Wall, a retaining wall of the Temple Mount, (not a wall of the Temple itself,) is not the last remaining vestige of the Temple complex. In fact, there are many extant remains of the Temple complex. The southern, eastern and northern retaining walls are also still extant. Surviving features abutting the southern walls include a broad stairway leading up to the Temple Mount’s entrance and two gates, known as the Huldah Gates, which provided access to the Temple Mount (Hershel Shanks, Jerusalem: An Archeological Biography, p. 143.) Some of the interior part of the Herodian Double Gate (which is one of the Huldah Gates) is also still intact. There are also surviving underground remnants of the Temple complex, including the area known as Solomon’s Stables. In addition, an area called Robinson’s Arch, in the south-western corner of the Temple complex, still remains. In his book, Shanks provides details concerning numerous other vestiges.

Multiple media outlets have corrected this same error in the past, including most recently The Los Angeles Times and Associated Press.

CAMERA has contacted AFP about the errors, but editors have yet to correct.

Jordanian officials agree with Israeli officials that Jordanian carpenter Mohammed Jawawdah attacked Israeli embassy guard Ziv Moyal with a screwdriver before Moyal shot him dead. But Reuters refuses to report the Jordanian confirmation. In story after story, rather than reporting Jawawdah’s attack on Moyal as fact, the influential wire service attributes the information to Israel, as if Jordan has not confirmed the attack, and as if the facts are not known.

Here’s what Jordan’s Public Security Directorate concluded last week, and what Reuters refuses to tell readers:

Based on statements by eyewitnesses, Two persons came at the apartment located inside the compound to furnish the bedroom.

during [sic] the work inside the apartment, a dispute has erupted between carpenters as one of them is the son of carpentry owner, a verbal arguments delayed the completion of work. the [sic] son of carpentry owner attacked the Israeli diplomat who responded by shooting the carpenter the apartment owner. Injuries of both wounded led to instantaneous death upon arrival to the medical hospital.

Testimonies of eyewitnesses revealed that during the verbal argument between the carpenter and the son of carpentry owner, the carpenter attacked the Israeli diplomat who responded by shooting. The owner of the apartment was shot and pronounced dead. The testimony of the door man was the same of other eye witnesses.

The fact that multiple Jordanian eyewitnesses concur that Jawawdeh attacked the Israeli guard has not prevented Reuters from attributing the information only to Israel. Today, for example, in an article about an averted face-off between a Jordanian and an Israeli lawmaker (“Netanyahu calls off fistfight between Israeli, Jordanian lawmakers“), Reuters qualifies:

The July 23 shooting to death of two Jordanians by an Israeli embassy guard who said he was acting in self-defense has outraged Amman, stirred up pro-Palestinian sentiment in the kingdom and prompted U.S. mediation efforts.

In a July 28 article (“Jordanian protesters at Israeli embassy call for ending peace treaty“), Reuters likewise concealed the Jordanian finding that Jawawdeh attacked Moyal:

Israel said the guard had been defending himself after Jawawdeh assaulted him with a screwdriver in a “terrorist attack”.

On July 27 (“Jordan’s king demands Israel put guard on trial for killing Jordanians“) as well Reuters attributed the information only to Israel, ignoring the Jordanian confirmation that Jawawdeh attacked the Israel:

Israel said the guard had been defending himself after Jawawdah attacked him with a screwdriver in a “terrorist attack”.

CAMERA contacted Reuters about the failure to note that a Jordanian investigation found that the Jordanian worker attacked the Israel embassy guard, but the wire service stands by its reporting and continues to churn out the skewed account.

In contrast, the Associated Press has explicitly reported that Jordanian authorities confirmed that Jawawdeh attacked the Israeli:

Jordanian authorities have said the guard opened fire Sunday after a 16-year-old attacked him with a screw driver during a furniture delivery to the embassy.

See also: How Reuters Twists a Fistfight That Never Was

Aug. 7 Update: New York Times “Journeys” Corrects on Gaza Area “Settlements”

In an illuminating and ironic gem, The New York Times markets its “Journeys” tour to Israel and the West Bank as follows:

On this nine-day itinerary, travel with experts from The New York Times, a leader in its evenhanded coverage of Israel, Palestine and the Middle East.

Referring to the West Bank as “Palestine” contravenes standard New York Times style. References to a modern “Palestine” in the West Bank and Gaza are inaccurate, and those areas should be referred to the West Bank and Gaza or, where appropriate “Palestinian Authority territories.” National Geographic, The Los Angeles Times, and Voice of America have commendably corrected this very same point in recent weeks.

By inaccurately referring to the West Bank as “Palestine,” The New York Times unintentionally tips off perceptive and informed readers that far from being “a leader in its evenhanded coverage,” the Gray Lady has a longstanding tilt against Israel. As Margaret Sullivan, then public editor exhorted in 2014:

Strengthen the coverage of Palestinians. They are more than just victims, and their beliefs and governance deserve coverage and scrutiny. Realistic examinations of what’s being taught in schools, and the way Hamas operates should be a part of this. What is the ideology of Hamas; what are its core beliefs and its operating principles? What is Palestinian daily life like? I haven’t seen much of this in The Times.

(The Times recently eliminated its public editor positon. Not a promising sign for those concerned about “evenhanded coverage.”)

The “Journeys” promotional material also refers to “settlements surrounding the Gaza Strip.” But the term “settlements” in The New York Times (and in common usage) is used specifically to denote communities built in disputed territory, and in the Western milieu it is not used in reference to villages inside Israel. This usage is especially problematic in light of the fact that the newspaper often raises questions about the legal legitimacy of “settlements.” The inaccurate message to readers, then, is that these towns in Israel near the Gaza Strip are somehow controversial or disputed.

So while The Times gears up for an “evenhanded” tour around “Palestine” and the “settlements surrounding the Gaza Strip” to mark “Seventy Years of the State of Israel,” we invite readers to a discovery journey of over 80 New York Times errors — all of them tilted in one direction (against Israel) — and all of them corrected after CAMERA’s intervention.