Roger L. Simon is correct when he writes:
I was up early this morning to help with PJM’s ongoing coverage of the Al Dura Trial in Paris. We seem to be almost alone in the US media bothering with this trial, yet it has arguably tremendous historical significance.
Of course the U.S. media, and, I suspect the media around much of the world are incapable of introspection. The Enderlin/Karsenty case reflects badly on the media and their capacity to remain objective observers.
From what I’ve read of the case so far, France 2 has been incredibly arrogant in its approach. Back in Novermber its behavior led observers to believe that in an American court, the network would have been held in contempt for its correspondent’s blatant falsehoods on the stand.
According to Backspin that same old arrogance was evident today:
“It was a fight of the institutional thinking,” said Mozes. “The strongest argument France 2 could come up with is that Charles Enderlin is an institution in this country. They said that [Jamal] Al-Dura was visited by King Hussein, which shows how important this case is. France 2 wanted to show how respected personalities participated. They hardly challenged the facts and preferred to play up the players and institutions involved.”
This is beyond belief. The event in question occurred at the end of September 2000. King Hussein died February 1999, about 20 months earlier. So his visit to Jamal al-Dura was really important: either he was divinely prescient or he returned from the grave. I’m surprised that no one called France 2 on that.[see below for an update]
Regardless, Phillippe Karsenty isn’t out of the woods. Backspin’s correspondent writes:
Mozes said the French TV network’s lawyers also sought to discredit Karsenty with handwriting analysis, treating him him as lightweight. “They ridiculed him, like, how dare he criticize an institution like France 2” Mozes said.Will the three-judge panel break from the conventional wisdom? That’s the million dollar question. “It’ll require a lot of courage,” Mozes said, crediting Judge Laurence Trebucq for giving Karsenty time and leeway to show all the material he wanted.
Although Mozes described Karsenty’s presentation as “cool and articulate,” Mozes suggests Karsenty may have overprepared. “There are so many strong arguments showing that something isn’t right with the video. Karsenty got lost in a huge number of arguments, rather than hammer home at three or four.”
For more background see this video interview with Tom Gross.
UPDATE: Originally Backspin reported that it was King Hussein. When I pointed out that King Hussein had already died at that time, my contact realized that the problem might have been in the transmission of the information. In an NYT story on the subject, it mentions Jordan’s king. It’s possible that France 2 used the same designation and the correspondent accidentally substituted the name of the longstanding monarch.Crossposted on Soccer Dad.
