>> Do you get all your information about the Middle Eastern conflict from official Israeli sources? <<
got to be careful with israeli sources, they have different versions for different audiences. (the exact thing netanyahu always accuses arafat of).
Looking Behind Ha'aretz's Liberal Image
antiwar.com
A new Israeli web-site, supported by two major settlers' sites from the West Bank and Gaza Strip, is dedicated to the holy cause of "encouraging and supporting the employment of Jews only". It is already listing dozens of Israeli firms that do not employ "Gentiles". In the first months of the Intifada, Israeli racists initiated a boycott of Arab shops and restaurants; now, employment of Arabs is targeted. Let's keep the inevitable historical analogies for another time; the point I want to make now is, that most of you haven't heard of this web-site. Right?
The site is neither confidential nor is it my discovery: I simply read about it in the Hebrew Ha'aretz a few days ago (24.9.02). But most of you could not. Why? Because this item was left out of Haaretzdaily.com, the English version of Ha'aretz.
Haaretzdaily.com is not Ha'aretz
Is this a mistake? An exception? No it is not. Ha'aretzdaily.com is not a full translation of the Hebrew paper; it's a selection. It often omits certain items, certain columns, that Ha'aretz does not find "suitable" for foreign eyes, like the report I just mentioned.
Another way to achieve the same hidden bias is by "nationalistically correct" translations. For example, when Hebrew Ha'aretz read (2.7.02): "Recent reports about Egyptian intentions to develop nuclear weaponry WERE APPARENTLY THE RESULT OF ISRAELI PSYCHOLOGICAL WARFARE AND do not match intelligence information in Jerusalem, according to a senior Israeli official", the English translation simply omitted the words I've capitalised.
Or, quoting an Israeli officer on the use of Palestinians as "human shields", the English version read (16.8.02): "Before the search [in a Palestinian house] we go to a neighbour, take him out of his house and tell him to call the people we want out of the next door house. [...] The neighbour does not have the option to refuse to do it. He shouts, knocks on the door and says the army's here. If nobody answers, he comes back and we go to work." Sounds pretty harmless? – Just because the last sentence is a "nationalistically correct" translation of the following Hebrew sentence: "If nobody answers, we have to tell the neighbour that he will be killed if no one comes out."
Ha'aretz, Not What You Thought
Of course the "nationalistic correctness" of Ha'aretz is not confined to its English version. In the last two years – which saw both the Intifada and the launching of its English on-line edition – Ha'aretz has taken a sharp turn to the nationalistic right.
A lecture delivered at the end of May by its editor-in-chief is worth reading to understand that. In the lecture, at the 9th World Editors' Forum in Bruges, Belgium, Hanoch Marmari seems to have had two objectives: one was to affirm Ha'aretz's liberal image as a serious, "global brand" quality-paper: quite understandable considering his function and audience. But the other objective, just as apparent, was to discredit allegations of an Israeli massacre in Jenin. Typically, it's this second issue that Marmari introduces first, at the very opening of his lecture: "First, the good news: Abu Ali's nine children are alive and well – as well as children can be among the ruins of the Jenin refugee camp. Please deliver this news to all of your friends".
The two objectives – serving the paper's image and serving Israel's propaganda – are highly interwoven; which of them prevails? Denying the massacre cannot contribute to Ha'aretz's reputation; whereas Ha'aretz's reputation is quite essential for denying a massacre in Jenin, as well as for disseminating other official Israeli positions.
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