Reading Progress:

The NYT vs. Haaretz on Recent Violence in Palestine

by Nov 13, 2015Foreign Policy0 comments

The New York Times building in New York City (Haxorjoe/Wikimedia Commons)
To see how biased the New York Times is, one need look no further than reporting from the Israeli daily Haaretz for comparison.

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The narrative presented by the New York Times:

The attack on Tuesday appeared to reflect a looplike dynamic of Israeli-Palestinian violence: stabbings of Israelis followed by swift, often deadly responses by Israeli security forces and graphic video footage inspiring replica Palestinian attacks against Israelis.

Meanwhile, in the Israeli daily Haaretz, one can read:

The riddle the Israeli security establishment has been trying to solve for past few weeks, as to the reason the focus of escalation moved between Jerusalem and Hebron, is not complicated. These are the two cities in which settlers are living in the heart of the Palestinian population…. From the Palestinian perspective, life goes on under the shadow of daily violent provocation and endless humiliation.

And:

Palestinian youth engaging in terror recently are not acting on anyone’s orders but rather motivated to act “based on feelings of national, economic and personal deprivation,” according to a report by Israel’s Shin Bet security services released on Tuesday.

It’s not that the New York Times completely disregards the perspective of the Palestinians, though. Twenty paragraphs into the twenty-eight paragraph article cited above, it states:

Palestinian officials say Israel’s occupation of the West Bank and settlement construction are the triggers of violence. They have accused the Israeli police and security forces of adopting a shoot-to-kill policy that amounts to extrajudicial executions of Palestinians accused of stabbings or attempted stabbings of Israelis.

But, then, here is how the Times treats Israel’s occupation:

The attacks took place in Pisgat Zeev, which Israelis describe as a Jewish neighborhood in predominantly Arab East Jerusalem, but which the Palestinians and much of the world consider an illegal settlement.

This is a disgrace to journalism.

Please, oh dear New York Times, enlighten us as to which countries in the world do not consider Israel’s settlements in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, to be illegal.

The answer?

Zero.

There is not a country on the planet that disputes that the settlements are illegal.

It isn’t a matter of opinion.

There isn’t any debate over it.

It isn’t in even the least bit controversial.

It is a simple point of fact under international law recognized by every single nation on the planet apart from Israel itself that Pisgat Zeev and every other Israeli settlement in East Jerusalem and the West Bank are illegal.

For the Times to present it as though this was merely a Palestinian claim and to deceive its readers as though there was controversy over this among the international community is simply despicable.

Here’s the headline from another Times article from this week:

E.U. Move to Label Israeli Settlement Goods Strains Ties

It explains how the EU has moved to establish guidelines that would require goods produced in Israeli settlements to be labelled as such.

There isn’t a single mention in the entire article that the settlements are illegal — not even so much as a statement that “Palestinians and much of the world consider” them illegal.

Just silence.

Now, can anyone please tell me how that fact is in any way not relevant context for people to be aware of as they read that article?

Disgraceful.

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