WaPo reports Israeli government shake-up through a pro-Palestinian lens

Leo Rennert
American Thinker
17 January '11

Jerusalem correspondent Joel Greenberg, in a Jan. 17 Washington Post dispatch, reports that the break-up of Israel's Labor Party has resulted in one faction, led by Defense Minister Ehud Barak, that will remain in the government, and another faction that is quitting the Likud-led coalition of Prime Minister Netanyahu and going into opposition ("Israeli defense minister quits Labor Party, forms centrist faction.")

Greenberg acknowledges that the move, far from weakening the government, will make it more stable and coherent now that it no longer is constantly faulted from within by Labor left-wingers about lack of progress in achieving peace with the Palestinians -- a new reality that also should make it clear to Palestinian leaders that they no longer can remain on the sidelines waiting for a more accommodating ruling coalition.

But Greenberg then strays from straightforward political reporting and injects his own personal assessment, mirroring the political views of left-wing Laborites defecting from the government, that the change heralds "deepening doubts about prospects for peace" because the more conservative remaining parties in Netanyahu's coalition "oppose significant concessions to the Palestinians."

There are at least three problems with Greenberg's conclusion that this bodes ill for the peace process, starting with the obvious first point that such personal judgments belong on the editorial page, and not in a purported "news" article.

(Read full "WaPo reports Israeli government shake-up through a pro-Palestinian lens")

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