CNN Arabic Calls Western Wall ‘Al Buraq’
May 16 Update: CAMERA Arabic Prompts CNN Arabic Correction on ‘Al Buraq’ Wall
Jack Ma visits the Western Wall May 2018 (Photo from Western Wall Heritage Foundation)
Early this month, Alibaba CEO Jack Ma visited the Western Wall, donning a kippah and honoring the holy Jewish site, a remnant of the Jewish Temple compound. On what basis, then, did CNN Arabic refer to the site using its Muslim name, “Al Buraq wall”?
As CAMERA Arabic earlier noted, a CNN Arabic story seems to violate CNN practice by referring to the Western Wall, one of Judaism’s holiest sites, by a Muslim name, “Al Buraq Wall.” The May 2 article (“Founder of the ‘Ali Baba’ group to visit Israel and meet Netanyahu“), says of Ma’s visit to the Jewish holy site: “Activists on social networking photographed Ma, standing by the Wall of Al-Buraq in Jerusalem during his visit to Israel.”
Use of an Islamic name in context of a visit intended to honor the site’s special status in Judaism is clearly inappropriate and misleading. Furthermore, not only does CNN in English not use the term “Al-Buraq” wall to refer to the Western Wall, but CAMERA Arabic has confirmed that CNN Arabic has not used this misleading term in the past.
CAMERA has contacted CNN to request modification of the terminology. Stay tuned for an update.
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