A May 9 On Point discussion, “The Fatah-Hamas Deal,” was not evenhanded. Instead of a debate between David Horovitz, Jerusalem Post Editor-in-Chief, and Sari Nusseibeh, President and professor of philosophy at Al-Quds University of Jerusalem, the program was a lopsided presentation of the Israeli and Palestinian positions: Mr. Horovitz was limited to seven minutes of air time while Mr. Nusseibeh, who followed him, was allotted 38 minutes. That’s more than a 5 to 1 air-time ratio for the Palestinian position versus the Israeli position.

Horovitz, expressing a mainstream Israeli viewpoint, noted the improbability of obtaining a viable peace deal with a Palestinian partnership that includes Hamas, who is committed (according to its charter,
statements and actions) to destroying Israel. Nusseibeh presented the viewpoint that Israel should not oppose the Fatah-Hamas union. He disingenuously equated Israeli right wing parties with Hamas:

Just as in Israel where you have opposition parties that do not believe in real peace or compromises with the Palestinians, certainly it is possible also to have people on the Palestinian side that share the same kind of sentiments but in the opposite direction.

One small matter is overlooked here: Israeli parties rejecting the viability of peace with Palestinians don’t terrorize their Arab neighbors with hundreds of rocket attacks.

Host Tom Ashbrook is no stranger to providing unbalanced Middle East On Point discussions as CAMERA has documented here, here, here and here.

Ashbrook and On Point can be contacted or e-mailed at onpoint@wbur.org

Public radio station WGBH’s May 4 Emily Rooney show aired a discussion entitled, “Shining A Light On Sexual Assault In The Peace Corps.” About two thirds of the way through the segment, Rooney briefly touched on mistreatment of women in the Middle East, singling out by country name only Egypt and Israel for criticism:

After watching Lara Logan on [CBS’] “60 Minutes” on Sunday night – it was just unbelievable – telling a tale about her rape and sexual assault in February of this year while covering the uprising in Egypt. Two hundred or three hundred men jumped on her, raped her violently, tried to tear her limbs off – tried to tear her hair out. She was in a country – and she recognized as much and said – where women are not valued in the same way as men. That is true of a large part – if not the entire Middle East, Israel included – I’m sorry to say – and I really wonder – I mean, knowing that – that is the case, what can a Peace Corps do?

Sorry to say, Ms. Rooney, you are vastly misinformed about the position of women In Israel. They have equal rights and opportunities generally similar to that of women in other advanced countries. It is totally unjustifiable to equate, as you did, the generally problematic status of Middle East women with the status of Israeli women. While there are still some problems, as there are here in the U.S. and other Western countries, they pale in comparison to the problems faced by women in most Middle East societies, as typified by the Palestinian territories.

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The May/June 2011 issue of the authoritative Biblical Archaeology Review (BAR), contains an article, “The Lion and the Flea,” in which BAR’s
editor, Hershel Shanks, writes: “J’accuse! I accuse the television program 60 Minutes of unethical and irresponsible reporting.” Mr. Shanks’ accusation involves a March 2008 broadcast on certain artifacts in Israel alleged to be forgeries. The artifacts, if real, would be the first found connecting Jews directly to the Temple Mount and would obviously support the historical accuracy of the Bible and underscore Jewish ties to the land of Israel. Is this why 60 Minutes might want to distort the facts to portray the artifacts as fake?

The long-running CBS program is no stranger to charges of unfair reporting. Several CAMERA articles have documented distorted 60 Minutes reporting that denigrated Israel.

National Public Radio’s Diane Rehm is the host of the talk radio program, “The Diane Rehm Show.” This nationally-syndicated show airs daily on more than 150 NPR member stations, including in major markets such as New York, Washington, D.C. and Boston. The April 7 program, “The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict in a New Arab World,” upheld NPR’s reputation for unobjective, unbalanced Arab-Israeli coverage (for example, here and here).

The show provided obfuscation and distortion from an imbalanced panel. Members included a spokesman for the Arab side, James Zogby, in addition to Aaron David Miller (former State Department advisor) and Greg Myre (NPR editor). Zogby smoothly delivered pro-Palestinian, anti-Israel propaganda. Neither Miller nor Myre directly challenged Zogby’s partisan presentation. Neither did Rehm, the host. The panel included no pro-Israeli representative to balance Zogby, an author, pro-Arab activist, and president of the Arab American Institute.

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Mainstream American media reporting on the passing of Elizabeth Taylor generally ignored her support for Israel. A notable exception was a March 27 Washington Post (Outlook section) commentary which noted that Ms. Taylor “was also a supporter of Israel to a degree that largely went unmentioned this past week.”

A Partial list of Elizabeth Taylor’s Israel-related activities:

• In 1959 Ms. Taylor bought $100,000 in Israeli bonds. As a result, The United Arab Republic (Egypt and Syria) officially banned all her motion pictures.

• In 1962 Ms. Taylor was barred from entering Egypt as she was blacklisted for being Jewish. As a result, the filming of Cleopatra filming had to be moved from Egypt. The Jerusalem Post (April 6, 2011) noted that: “Gen. Essam Elmasri, head of the Cairo regional bureau of the Israel Boycott Office, [in 1962] said in the Egyptian capital that Miss Taylor will not be allowed to come to Egypt because she has adopted the Jewish faith and supports Israeli causes.”

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On March 10, viewers of C-SPAN’s morning show, Washington Journal, heard vilification of Jews, Israel and U.S. policy by callers responding to the topic “Today’s hearing: Islamic radicalization in U.S.” The topic referred to the first day of U.S. House hearings, entitled “The Extent of Radicalization in the American Muslim Community and that Community’s Response,” led by Homeland Security Committee Chairman Rep. Peter T. King, (R-NY).

Non-commercial C-SPAN, funded by the members of the cable-television industry (such as Comcast) but operating autonomously under a board of directors drawn from the industry, is watched weekly by what it claims are tens of millions of viewers, generally tolerates, without challenge, verbal attacks on Jews, Israel and as well, U.S. foreign policy supportive of the Jewish state, on its Washington Journal call-in talk show 7-10 AM daily. Journal moderators (and guests) typically tolerate anti-Jewish, anti-Israel tirades. No other religious/ethnic/national group is subjected to a steady dose of abuse on C-SPAN.

Only one of the 15 Journal callers during this segment on Muslim radicalization lambasted Islam or Muslims. “Darwin,” asserting that most of the previous Journal callers on this day were ignorant of the teachings of the Koran (the Muslim scriptures), said: “…to annihilate Christians and Jews. That’s the instruction of the Koran.” But three callers directly attacked Jews/Israel. Two of the three, like callers to previous Journal broadcasts, vented animosity toward U.S. Senator Joseph Lieberman of Connecticut, the first Jew to run on a major party presidential ticket (Democrats – Gore/Lieberman in 2000).

Watch the video clip of “Anita’s” anti-Semitic monologue which included:

I am Republican. I wanted to vote for George Bush, but I felt that there would be a war because I was told that Republicans usually engage in war and I couldn’t vote for him but I would not vote for Joe Lieberman with Al Gore because I felt that the Jewish interest was there and that was not the interest in America that we should be looking at. I happen to be Muslim-American …

Watch the video clip of “Consuela’s” conspiracy-spinning tirade which included:

I want to say something about Peter King. What is his proof of this radicalization that he is speaking of, that he is proposing here? And talking about him and Lieberman – I mean, do the American public get the connection here? You’re talking about a lot of Jewish influence here on the Americans to kind of put us against – Christians against Muslims – and you’ve got this Jewish influence that’s causing this…What about the Zionists – what is being promoted in the Jewish synagogues? What is being said there? Because there is a lot of xenophobia about radicalization that’s going on here in Baltimore…

Watch the video clip of “Khalid’s” long, nearly uninterrupted anti-Israel, anti-U.S. ramble which included:

I would like to say “salam aleichem” to all the Muslims in the world. I just wanted to touch on a couple points. The first thing is, if any Muslim in the world believes that America is going to apply justice to any Muslim anywhere in the world … all you have to do is look at Palestine. Palestine is the model of how America, the European Union, and all the other European countries treat Muslims… [In the video clip, notice that the moderator terminated the lengthy, monotonous tirade only when it became abundantly clear that the caller could continue venting his animosity indefinitely.]

It’s not simply wrong for C-SPAN to welcome callers who, regardless of announced topic, excoriate Jews and Israel, especially when the network allows no other minority group or nation to be so attacked, it’s intolerable. Cable television viewers should e-mail, call or write your cable service providers and urge them to call for an end to such “hands off anti-Jewish prejudice” by Washington Journal since a portion of your cable fees supports C-SPAN.

The problems of C-SPAN’s Washington Journal telecast – the program is a platform for anti-Israel and anti-Semitic callers who are rarely, if ever, interrupted or challenged by Journal hosts – routinely include serious lapses by the hosts. This was exemplified by Steve Scully’s day at the office on Feb. 27, 2011.

Early in the telecast, Scully selected and read, without comment, a defamation of Israel in the form of a Tweet that recommended Rev. Desmond Tutu of South Africa as an advisor to President Barack Obama because he “can help Obama recognize the apartheid that is taking place in Israel.” Scully did not not respond at all, let alone to note that this apartheid canard’s aim has been to de-legitimize Israel. Neither did the host point out Tutu’s history of anti-Israeli, anti-Jewish positions (see, for example, the CAMERA Op-Ed “Carter’s Elders of anti-Zion”).

Scully’s disconnected manner may have led him into rumor-mongering following a 9:48 AM call about the presumed departure of Libya’s leader Muammar Gaddafi: “I saw the other day that he [Gaddafi] does have Jewish roots. Technically he could go to Israel because of his – either grandmother or …”

Is there any substance to the Gaddafi-has-a-Jewish-grandmother story or is it the latest variant on the recurrent libel alleging that infamous Jew-haters like Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Gaddafi and Nazi leader Adolf Hitler have Jewish ancestors? Scully does not bother to inquire.

The host’s lack of awareness or interest on this day included a failure to recognize the 9:48 AM caller (“This is my second time today. Thank you very much.”) as the same person who had called at 7:06 AM. Never mind that C-SPAN supposedly enforces a 30-day rule to prevent individuals from calling more than once a month, Scully ignored the caller’s admission.

Just another day at the office for another C-SPAN Washington Journal host too disengaged to actually moderate the program.

The February 8, 2011 Hannity show (Fox News Channel) included an interview of former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.

The worst (moment of my tenure as Defense Secretary) – one of the worst – was the statement in the Press that someone in Guantanamo had flushed the Koran down the toilet. In the book I talk about that. There were riots in several cities and people were killed. Totally untrue, it never happened.

HANNITY: “Newsweek.”

RUMSFELD:

Exactly. Later they said if part of our story wasn’t correct, we apologize. Of course the people they were apologizing to were dead. If those people (media) want to be first instead of accurate, that’s too bad. I’ve never been in that business so I can’t be critical of them. I just don’t know what I would do. It was hard to see those kinds of things said. Of course, a lie races around the world 15 times before the truth gets its boots on.

In 2005, CAMERA reported the story here.

Here is President Obama’s July 6, 2010 demand of the Palestinians to stop inciting their people to hatred and violence against Israelis:

I think it’s very important that the Palestinians not look for excuses for incitement; that they are not engaging in provocative language; that at the international level, they are maintaining a constructive talk, as opposed to looking for opportunities to embarrass Israel.
(From press conference held jointly with Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu)

But this demand is ignored by Mahmoud Abbas’ Palestinian Authority. Palestinian Media Watch (PMW) monitors the incitement. Here are just two of PMW’s recent findings:

• September 10, 2010 (PA TV)

Palestinian Authority television broadcast says Jews praying at Western Wall are “sin and filth.”

• September 9, 2010 (PA newspaper)

A Palestinian Authority newspaper informed its readers that the Palestinian ambassador to Lebanon revealed that the actual Palestinian goal in the current peace talks with Israel is to undermine Israel’s legitimacy in the eyes of the world.

But the American media, focused on the settlement freeze, is oblivious to the Palestinian incitement issue. Apparently the media believes that the expanding of housing facilities constitutes much more of an obstacle to peace than preaching hate and inciting violence.