The other day James North and I did a post pointing out how the New York Times’ own commenters had torpedo’d a New York Times story that laid blame for the latest impasse in negotiations at the feet of a stiffnecked Mahmoud Abbas (sorry for that metaphor!).
Well Times public editor Margaret Sullivan has registered the same groundswell, in email’d complaints. And while quoting foreign editor Joseph Kahn at length with the usual evenhanded policy statement, Sullivan sides with the readers! Here’s an excerpt of her consideration; judgment is in the last paragraph:
David L. Mandel of Sacramento was one of many readers who wrote to object to an article in Wednesday’s Times on the breakdown in peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians. Like many others, he found the headline misleading and the article itself lacking in context.
He wrote, in part:
‘As a veteran copy editor, I know that even the best headline writers sometimes miss the point of a story. But such sloppiness can’t be blamed for Tuesday’s report, “Abbas Takes Defiant Step, and Mideast Talks Falter.” Only four paragraphs down do we read that the Palestinian president’s step followed Israel’s reneging on an unambiguous promise to release a fourth batch of long-serving prisoners.’
Susan Webb of New Haven registered her similar reaction, writing: “The lead states that Palestinian leaders’ actions are ‘leaving the troubled Middle East talks brokered by Secretary of State John Kerry on the verge of breakdown.’ The clear implication is that the ‘verge of breakdown’ is caused by the Palestinians’ unilateral actions.” Later in the article, she notes, the Palestinian move is described as a reaction to Israel’s “failure to release a fourth batch of long-serving Palestinian prisoners by last Saturday and the time for additional diplomatic maneuvering had run out.”…
My take: The readers have a point. The combination of headline and initial paragraphs failed to appropriately convey the full scope of the situation. I agree with Mr. Kahn, however, that this does not reflect any larger effort by The Times to lay the impasse at the Palestinians’ feet.
Sullivan continues to impress with her tone, her detachment. (And yes Sullivan had Mandel for downfield blocking.) Now when is she going after a Times reporter’s shameful treatment of Jimmy Carter?
Sullivan is one of the best public editors I have ever read. She isn’t afraid to take on unpopular opinions. I disagreed with her on the terminology of “illegal immigrants” – some wanted the Times’ to drop the phrase in favor of “undocumented workers”, but she made a pretty good case, one that I ultimately disagreed with, about keeping it. I was still impressed at her courage considering the political inclinations of her base.
This may seem obvious, that public editors should have courage but most of those I have seen have shied away from real topics of controversy and many have retreated into a technical discussion of procedural nonsense which doesn’t lead anymore(precisely the point).
On I/P she isn’t really going against the readership base, rather she is going against her fellow employees. More or less everyone who writes about the Middle East at the Times is a committed Zionist. Rudoren, Bronner, Kershner, Stolberg and so on.
It shows in the reporting.
The problem here was that the official “party line” in our one-party “democracy” is that Israel can do no wrong and the corollary is that it’s always OK to blame Palestinians for things that “go wrong” (as the peace process is said to have done — once more, and counting in the 100s). So a NYT reporter who often talks to the usual DoS folks is likely to pick up the usual vibes (blame Abbas). This is a problem rather like racism and other unconscious knee-jerk ways of talking (and thinking). Apparently this time, the knee-jerking was on the part of a headline writer (who has been writing similar headlines for years and knows the “drill”).
This was how the failure of the Clinton Camp David peace-process-event was unfairly blamed on the Palestinians.
Knee-jerk jerks. Meanwhile, “the danger of peace has receded” sez Likud pol., not troubling with the crocodile tears.
I would assume this is a football terminology:
This nitwit would appreciate help, even more if I am absolutely misguided in my assumption. Ok, seems I am not wrong
Is it possible to explain this without going into to lengthy explanations of the complete football rules?
“I agree with Mr. Kahn, however, that this does not reflect any larger effort by The Times to lay the impasse at the Palestinians’ feet.”
LMAO. Yeah, the fact that it just so happened to coincide with the “pro-Israel regardless of merit” history of the NYT is merely coincidence.
Please also check out Ali Abunimah’s story about how today’s NY Times Kerry story rewrites James Baker’s 1990 testimony, where he scathingly gave out the White House phone number and told Israel “When you are serious about peace, call us,” to include the Palestinians:
There was an echo, in Mr. Kerry’s tone, of a frustrated outburst in 1990 by James A. Baker III, secretary of state under President George Bush, who read out the number for the White House switchboard at a congressional hearing and told the Israelis and Palestinians, “When you’re serious about peace, call us.”
The Baker video and the Times’s own reporting at the time by Thomas Friedman make clear he meant only Israel. This seriously needs a correction by the Times.
http://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali-abunimah/ny-times-rewrites-peace-process-history-make-it-more-balanced