Once again we find jewish media sources confirming what the informed reader of the MSM already knows: it is heavily pro-Israel. Even when jewish pressure groups and communal organizations attack an 'anti-Israel' group, op-ed or news story: it is increasingly clear that their categorization of just what is 'anti-Semitic' or 'anti-Israel' is becoming more and more strained with the increasing censorship and suppression of anti-jewish and anti-Zionist voices on Campus.
After all jews and their apologists rely on what we may style an eternal state of emergency in relation to the supposed upcoming 'second holocaust' and with an increasingly compliant amen corner for Israel in the MSM (the opposite trend is true outside the MSM incidentally). It is simply becoming harder and harder for them to credibly accuse all and sundry of 'anti-Semitism' and being 'Nazis'.
Oh and look out for the truly hilarious (and typically Orwellian double-speak) quote from Dershy towards the end of the article. That's one to save for debating the Israel-Firsters on Facebook.
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Rubber and glue: Former Rutgers editor complains of a pro-Israel bias
Rubber and glue: Former Rutgers editor complains of a pro-Israel bias
A twist on recent Rutgers stories, in which Jewish leaders complain of an anti-Israel bias by editors of the campus daily, the Targum. In this case, a former editorial page editor complains of a pro-Israel bias, and capitulation to pressure from Jewish readers:
The outgoing opinions editor at Rutgers University’s student newspaper says editors repeatedly bowed to pressure from pro-Israel groups on campus, causing dissent within the newsroom, according to an essay published on the Huffington Post.
Amani Al-Khatahtbeh, whose term as opinions editor ended this month, alleges she was targeted by Jewish groups on campus because she was the only Arab-American student in a leadership position at the newspaper….
In her HuffPost piece, Al-Khatahtbeh describes the backlash to her decision to publish an opinion piece that she concedes had “anti-Semitic overtones”:
In the Board of Trustees’ private response to Hillel, which Hillel publicized in a press release on its website, it is stated that the board will be taking the unprecedented and “unusual step of requiring the editor-in-chief to submit all letters and commentary [on Israel/Palestine] to the board for approval before they can be published.” This is the unjustifiable — and hidden — way that the Board is responding to an anti-Semitic commentary written by a Rutgers student, which questioned the funding of Hillel and had absolutely nothing to do with the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
The Board of Trustees is not only catering to the sole requests of Hillel, but is also exercising an overarching and seemingly limitless power over editorial content — positioning itself for an unchecked exercise of censorship. Not only has the board been a complete enigma to the editorial staff and public and criticized for its lack of transparency, but information about its membership, capabilities and the limits of its editorial discretion are convoluted and not outlined anywhere on the Targum website.
Skylar Frederick, the Targum’s most recent managing editor, acknowledges a fairly heavy hand by the “adult” supervisors of the newspaper when it comes to Israel content. She tells Media Matters:
In the daily production of the paper, as of late, we’ve been sending them [the Targum's Board of Trustees] anything that’s pro-Israel, pro-Palestine or [involving] Hillel. The Board has asked us to send anything even mentioning the word ‘Israel’ to them for their approval, just to make sure we as students aren’t going to have to deal with a bunch of backlash. So no, they don’t have a hand in daily production of the paper. They really only step in when there’s a problem and when we ask them to or when they see there’s a problem that might hurt the company and make us in turn lose our funding.
Hillel and other groups welcomed the board’s recent announcement that it is “taking the unusual step” of requiring all letters to the editor and commentary regarding those matters to be submitted to the board for vetting. One can argue that a series of questionable decisions by Targum editors warranted this sort of intervention.
But is it really a victory? The Jewish community comes off looking extremely heavy handed, and the autonomy of a campus newspaper is compromised.
That doesn’t mean, however, that groups do nothing, or that the Targum be excused its missteps or excesses. But there is an alternative to prior approval, or whatever the board is calling it. Yes, freedom of the press comes with responsibility, and part of the university experience is educational. As Alan Dershowitz says, “As one who strongly opposes any censorship, my solution is to fight bad speech with good speech, lies with truth and educational malpractice with real education.” That means responding in kind to attacks and misinformation on Israel, and setting up opportunities not to censure young editors or make their decisions for them, but to educate and sensitize them about the concerns of the pro-Israel community so that they make better choices themselves.
Happily, in response to Hillel’s complaints, the Targum board said it “is exploring professional training with media industry experts. Once we decide on a program, all editors will be required to attend.” It’s a student-run paper, and it’s editors deserve to be treated as students — i.e., they have some learning to do. That’s what a university is for.