Barry Rubin wrote something in a column that essentially sums up what is wrong with reporting today. And what’s wrong with it? The media do not report the truth.
Here’s how a friend of mine summed up the recent period:
1) Reporters accepting as fact that a woman died of tear gas inhalation despite there being no recorded cases of such an occurrence ever happening.
2) Treating the Mavi Marmara incident as Israel said/Turkey said despite video evidence supporting Israel’s version. (Not to mention a hostile witness supporting Israel’s version.)
3) Taking the Palestine Papers at face value despite the fact that they came from al-Jazira, despite every bit of evidence about PA and Israeli negotiating positions. Despite, I might add, the fact that they include alleged statements like when the Israelis say they are going to return the Golan Heights to Syria, the Palestinians reply that they will compensate Israel with more concessions.
Look at item two. There is ample video evidence and testimony that the Turks attacked the IDF before the IDF even managed to board the Mavi Marmara, and yet, the AP continues to use this boilerplate:
Israeli commandos said they opened fire in self-defense after meeting what they called unexpected resistance when they boarded the ferry carrying aid supplies to Gaza.
Or this one:
Both soldiers and activists involved in the raid have said they acted in self-defense.
Reuters issued a story about the Turkish “investigation” as if it were actual news. Once again, there are videos showing exactly what happened as the soldiers were lowered onto the helicopter. There are videos showing exactly what happened as the soldiers drew up in boats alongside. In none of these videos did the IDF fire first. In all of these videos, the Turkish “activists” attacked the soldiers before they boarded the ship. After they were on board, the “activists” tried to kill them.
15. The three soldiers testified that while they were being held below decks a large number of operatives continued the attack, including choking and beating them with iron bars and wooden clubs. That was despite the fact that the hands of two were tied and the third was having convulsions and lost consciousness several times. The three were wounded and bleeding, and in need of medical treatment (one of them had been stabbed in the stomach and was critically wounded).
16. All three testified that during the incident their lives were in danger and they felt the operatives intended to kill them. They added that some of the passengers, those who were below decks, did not participate in the attacks and that there was a more moderate group of passengers who tried to protect them.1 They also stated that while they were being beaten below decks they were photographed many times.2
These testimonies are readily available to the media, yet they have not so much as printed a line of testimony by an IDF soldier. We heard the lies repeated about the Palestinian woman who supposedly died after inhaling teargas at a protest (she died of an overdose of medicine given by a Palestinian hospital, but of course, that was not sent around the world in thousands of headlines). But we’ve never seen an AP report that includes the following:
3) He continued, “…I was surrounded by five men, and one more who came a couple of seconds later…They beat me with iron bars…they hit me in the face with the bars, and on the head a lot. My head was protected by a helmet, and after the battle I was told that my helmet was completely shattered…I tried to use my hands to protect my face, so my hands got hit a lot, and one was broken [Note: One of his hands was found to have three broken bones and one cracked bone…]. Then a terrorist ran toward me with a knife and stabbed me in the chest as hard as he could…and all the time they kept beating me with iron bars. They beat my head, my stomach and my legs…I was hit on the head and the back of my neck a number of times and lost consciousness. The next thing I remember was regaining consciousness because of a severe pain in my knee…That was when I realized I had been shot in the knee. I also realized that my ear and head had been cut and that bones in my hand were broken…”
Instead, the AP minimized the attacks by downplaying the violence in each successive report, until now we have the wishy-washy boilerplate quoted above—the weaselly “both sides claim self-defense” line. To repeat: There is video evidence of the IHH terrorists attacking the IDF before they set foot on board the Mavi Marmara—but the standard media line is to insist that “both sides” claim self-defense.
Many bloggers and pundits constantly criticize Israel for not getting its side of the story out fast enough, for not seizing the media narrative quickly, and for not being as media-savvy as the Palestinians and their allies. But I would ask those bloggers and pundits: How the hell can Israel have an effective media strategy when the media refuse to tell the truth about the stories? The truth is right there, on effing video, and the media still hold the “both sides claim they acted in self-defense” line.
The best thing we can do, as bloggers, is continue to report what the media doesn’t. The truth is out there. Let’s make sure it gets out.