Goldflam - Akiva Eldar, Who Is Lying?

Yishai Goldflam
CAMERA Media Analysis
02 October '11

http://www.camera.org/index.asp?x_context=2&x_outlet=55&x_article=2122

Following last month's anti-climactic events in the United Nations, Ha'aretz journalist Akiva Eldar took it upon himself to serve as defense attorney for Mahmoud Abbas and the Palestinian Authority. While Eldar, like all opinion writers, has the right to voice his views on any subject, he does not have a license to misrepresent facts. Yet, last week (Sept. 26), in an Op-Ed bombastically titled "Netanyahu's speech of lies," Eldar charges the prime minister of lying, an accusation that rests in the realm of facts, not opinion. Either Netanyahu was lying or he was not. Either way, Eldar's allegations warrant a fact-check.

1. The Camp David Summit

In his column, Eldar sarcastically responds to the prime minister's statement in his speech that he intends to speak the truth. Eldar selects some of these "truths" and attempts to expose them as lies. The first example concerns the Camp David summit in 2000. Eldar is a big proponent of the theory that Camp David failed not because of Palestinian rejectionism, but rather due to some other amorphous reason. Thus he writes:

As a sage providing support for his own truth, Netanyahu claimed that in 2000 Israel "made a sweeping peace offer that met virtually all of the Palestinian demands." It would be interesting to hear the opinion of then-Prime Minister Ehud Barak on this "truth," for example on the Palestinian demands regarding the Temple Mount and the Palestinian refugee issue.

Elar's point is not entirely clear. Barak's offer was unprecedented in its willingness to meet Palestinian demands. Barak accepted the Clinton Parameters as a basis for negotiation in which the Muslim and Christian quarters would be entirely under Palestinian rule and accepted the division of Jerusalem including the transfer of sovereignty of Arab neighborhoods to the Palestinians. Regarding refugees, Barak proposed to permit some of them to come to Israel under the "family reunification" framework. Barak was also the first prime minister to agree to the exchange of territories and to withdrawal from parts of the Jordan Valley. As for the Temple Mount, Barak demanded maintaining Israeli sovereignty, but was was willing to consider Palestinian "custodianship," which the Palestinians understood to mean Palestinian sovereignty above ground, and Israeli sovereignty below ground (Al Quds, Aug. 18, 2000, translated by MEMRI).

Was this a "sweeping" offer? It appears to be. Does it meet all of the Palestinian demands? Apparently not. Does it meet almost all of their demands, as Netanyahu said? Definitely yes. Then how did Netanyahu lie? It seems he didn't.

Sternthal - Gideon Levy's Distorted Discourse

Tamar Sternthal
CAMERA Media Analysis
03 July '11



In a June 30 Ha'aretz Op-Ed entitled "Israel's violent discourse" (the online version is called "Israel has become a society of force and violence"), Gideon Levy's distorted discourse is once again on display. Revisiting his earlier untenable argument that Israel is determined to attack the peaceful flotilla participants, he resorts to falsehoods and misinformation.

No Exports?

First, he claims: "But no, Gaza is still not free -- far from it. It has no outlet to the sea or air, there are no exports." (Emphasis added.) His misleading assertion that there are "no exports" is typical Levy manipulation. According to data provided by Mohammed Skaik, the Trade Policy Specialist with PalTrade, who is responsible for all technical issues surrounding Gaza imports and export,

During the last export season (28 Nov 10 till 15 May 2011), a total of 290 truckloads including 210 truckloads (397 tonnes) of strawberry, 74 truckloads (10,668,520 stems) of cut-flower, 03 truckloads (06 tones) of sweet pepper and 03 truckload of cherry tomato (6.7 tonnes) were exported via Kerem Shalom. ("Weekly Analysis-Gaza Crossing Data from 19-25 June 2011")

While those figures are much lower than earlier years before the Gaza blockade, they nevertheless amount to more than 400 tons in less than six months. Why did the export of peppers, strawberries, carnations, and cherry tomatoes come to a halt last month, May 12? Is it because Israel has forbidden the ongoing export of these goods, as Gisha, an Israeli NGO, implies in a Jerusalem Post article today? In fact, the export of these cash crops ground to a halt because the season ended last month -- a fact confirmed in phone conversations both with Skaik as well as with Maj. Guy Inbar, the spokesman for Israel's COGAT. Furthermore, both men confirmed that plans are underway to enable the export of potatoes and regular tomatoes in the coming weeks. The Post article mentions that the plan would allow for the export of these crops directly to Jordan. Surely Levy, who travels to Stockholm where he documented flotilla preparations, can lift up the phone and speak with the Israeli and Palestinian officials dealing with Gaza. Of course he can, but that's really not the issue.

(Read full "Gideon Levy's Distorted Discourse")

Ha'aretz Interviewee Recalls Past Life Memories?

TS
CAMERA/Snapshots
18 May '11

http://blog.camera.org/archives/2011/05/haaretz_interviewee_recalls_pa.html

While Mahmoud Abbas was busy rewriting 1948 history in the New York Times yesterday, another, lesser-known, Arab public figure was apparently peddling his bobe-mayse in Ha'aretz . In a "Head to Head" interview with Eli Ashkenazi, Salman Fakherldeen, the public relations officer of Al-Marsad, the Arab Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Golan, refers to the "Nakba Day" infiltrations into Majdal Shams, and recalls:

It was as if the clock turned back, to 1948. I remember the village then full of refugees expelled from their homes, walking in the opposite direction, toward where their children and grandchildren came from on Sunday. I can really hear the echo of past history.

A powerful image, and a powerful memory. It apparently moved Ha'aretz editors, who selected it for a pull quote:

There's just one problem. The events of 1948 transpired 63 years ago. According to the article, Salman Fakherldeen is 57. The first sentence reads:

Salman Fakherldeen, 57, of Majdal Shams, is the public relations officer of Al-Marsad, the Arab Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Golan.

As we see it, there are three possible explanations for this conundrum.

1) Ha'aretz misreported his age. At the very minimum, how old would Mr. Fakherldeen have to be to so clearly remember events of 63 years ago? Probably around 67. Is this the image of a man closing in on his 70s?

2) He is recalling memories from a past life.

3) He is fabricating.

(See here for another personal 1948 conundrum.)

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Ha'aretz, Lost in Translation IV

TS
CAMERA/Snapshots
08 March '11

http://blog.camera.org/archives/2011/03/haaretz_lost_in_translation_iv.html

Ha’aretz seems to have learned a lesson in misrepresenting matters from the anti-Israeli foreign press. This is how it announced the appointment of a new foreign minister for Egypt on its English-language website:

He seems like just the sort of nice chap Israel should be happy to see rise to the top in the “new Egypt”.

Unfortunately, in the Hebrew version of the same announcement, it seems that Israel will be stuck with the “old Egypt”:

For those who do not read Hebrew, what this says is:
“Nabil el-Araby, who served as Egypt’s ambassador to the UN, replaced Achmed abu El Rit. In the past, he led initiatives against Israel”.

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A Case Study in the Goldstone Report’s Fundamental Dishonesty

Evelyn Gordon
Commentary/Contentions
03 January '11

As Omri Ceren noted last week, the Goldstone Report on Israel’s war with Hamas in Gaza has already prompted numerous detailed rebuttals. But with the report hitting the Israeli headlines again this month in honor of the war’s second anniversary, one cannot help being struck anew by its fundamental dishonesty.

A lengthy Haaretz piece published this weekend offers a salient example. Ironically, reporter Shay Fogelman tried hard to back Goldstone’s accusations. Thus, in an 8,000-word dissection of Israel’s attack on Palestinian police stations on December 27, 2008, the war’s opening day, he somehow didn’t find space to mention Hamas’s own recent admission that most of these policemen belonged to terrorist organizations, just as Israel had claimed all along. But he had plenty of space to quote such unbiased sources as an Al Jazeera reporter (“it was a massacre”).

Where it all falls apart, however, is when he comes to a detailed study submitted to the Goldstone panel that identified 286 of the 345 policemen killed — fully 83 percent — as members of terrorist organizations, based solely on public sources like Palestinian newspapers, the Palestinian Interior Ministry’s website, and the websites of Hamas and other terrorist organizations, where the policemen’s affiliation with various terror groups had been reported.

(Read full "A Case Study in the Goldstone Report’s Fundamental Dishonesty")

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Gideon Levy And The Dog That Doesn’t Bark

Eamonn McDonagh
Z-Word Blog
12 December '10

Gideon Levy says that…

1. The deficiencies in Israel’s firefighting capacity shown up by the Mount Carmel fire are firm evidence that Israel has no military option against Iran.

But might not the opposite argument - that the weaknesses shown up by the fire are now likely to be addressed and Israel will therefore soon be better placed to strike than it was before the fire - be just as valid?

2. In any future war with Lebanon and/or Iran the enemy’s focus will be on firing thousands of rockets at Israel’s population centers.

That’s not exactly news to anyone who takes an interest in these matters and Amos Yadlin, the former head of military intelligence, recently said as much in his farewell speech. Like so many others, Levy doesn’t regard it as worthy of comment that having despaired of defeating its armed forces, Israel’s enemies are now planning to destroy it by killing its civilians in massive numbers.

3.

This leads to the second, unavoidable conclusion, which should penetrate very deeply, not only among diplomats and commanders, but also among the many warmongers among us: the only existential option is integrating into the region.

(Read full "Gideon Levy And The Dog That Doesn’t Bark")

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How Haaretz concocted a conflict

Israel Resource Review
Kalman Liebskind
Investigative Reporter, Maariv
Nov. 12, 2010

-- On July 10, 2008 Ha’aretz’s main section contained a small story. Not small, tiny. 93 words to be precise. “The district committee,” stated the article, “has approved for public hearing the establishment of 920 housing units in the Har Homa neighborhood of Jerusalem.” The industrious journalist also included the city’s reasons for having chosen to promote the project: “this will serve as a housing alternative for young couples, after the controversial Safdie project was struck down.” Back then Ha’aretz did not believe that construction in East Jerusalem was a major story. This article was not even referenced in the front page, which was devoted to a kindergarten teacher who had abused children, a doctor who had been admitted to a psychiatric hospital and then committed suicide, and the important legal ruling that “prostitutes will receive minimum wage from their pimps.”

More than two years have passed since this meeting of the district committee in Jerusalem. The committee’s members, who, as reported by Ha’aretz, approved the plan, have not held a single meetings since 2008. Since that time, the plan has gone through several technical changes. It took nearly two years for the Housing Ministry to approve changes sought by the committee, such as changing the entrance level into the houses, the height of the supporting walls, and parking places.

(Read full article)

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Gideon Levy: baron of deceit industry exhuming wrong dogs

SnoopyTheGoon
Yourish.com
23 October '10

I am watching with some interest the unfolding battle between Ben Dror Yemini – opinion-editor of the daily newspaper Maariv and the self-appointed “conscience of Israel” – Gideon Levy, the editor (?) of Haaretz.

The fight started with Mr Levy giving a rather long and boring interview to his partner in journalistic sloppiness: Johann Hari of Independent. In this interview, among other “facts”, Gideon Levy has presented the following example of Israeli bloodthirstiness and lack of proper feelings:

During Operation Cast Lead, the Israel bombing of blockaded Gaza in 2008-9, “a dog – an Israeli dog – was killed by a Qassam rocket and it on the front page of the most popular newspaper in Israel. On the very same day, there were tens of Palestinians killed, they were on page 16, in two lines.”

Ben Dror Yemini, being more of a professional journalist than Levy will ever be, was incensed by this spoof and the whole travesty of the interview and has done something that Levy never bothers with: basic investigation.

(Read full post)

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Why does the West still respect Ha'aretz?

Elder of Ziyon
14 October '10

A couple of days ago, Ha'aretz reported that the PA approved a textbook teaching both the Zionist and Arab narratives of history that Israel had rejected. It made Israel look very bad.

Only one problem: The PA denied the story.

But this is hardly the first time Ha'aretz reported something that turned out to be fictional.

It was Ha'aretz that started the rumor that the 18th century Jewish sage the Vilna Gaon had predicted the building of the Third Temple would commence on March 16, 2010. That story caused many angry headlines in the Arab world and put peoples' lives at risk. And it was not true.

And remember this story from Ha'aretz last April?

A new military order aimed at preventing infiltration will come into force this week, enabling the deportation of tens of thousands of Palestinians from the West Bank, or their indictment on charges carrying prison terms of up to seven years.

When the order comes into effect, tens of thousands of Palestinians will automatically become criminal offenders liable to be severely punished.

(Read full post)

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Haaretz vs. JPost on Nobel winner vs. Israel

Elder of Ziyon
06 October '10

Commenter Womble picks up on a very interesting contrast between Ha'aretz and the Jerusalem Post's coverage of the winner of the Nobel Prize for Medicine.

Here's how Ha'aretz describes him:

Nobel-winning IVF pioneer has little love for his No. 1 consumer - Israel

Despite his unpleasant memories and unfavorable view of the Zionist homeland, few countries have benefited more than Israel from the revolutionary method of reproduction introduced by British scientist Robert Edwards.

Yesterday, the Nobel Foundation recognized Edwards for his efforts, granting him the 2010 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.

Edwards has been long regarded as the man who pioneered in vitro fertilization. In 1978, Edwards, along with colleague Patrick Steptoe, engineered the birth of the first-ever test-tube baby, Louise Brown. Prior to Edwards' invention, 10 percent of all couples worldwide suffered from infertility.

...Edwards' connection to Israel dates back to just after World War II, when he served with the British army in pre-state Mandatory Palestine.

(Read full post)

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Amira Hass Sees Vile, Racist, and Brutal Israelis

Michael Lumish
newsrealblog.com
25 June '10
Posted before Shabbat

One of the most common (and facile) accusations against Israel is that it is a racist country. Another equally facile accusation is that Israel is a brutal country. In a recent Ha’aretz article, columnist Amira Hass gives us two for the price of one. Israel is racist and brutal, both!

Here’s how the propaganda works. You find an obscure news story in which one, or more, Israelis behave badly and then use that story to suggest that it says something terribly negative about Israeli society as a whole. The hostile glare of the world spotlight on Israel is so intense that I sometimes expect to find a headline somewhere in the international press that reads, “Israeli Woman Spanks Unruly Child in Parking Lot, World Condemns the Jewish State.”

The story in this case, unfortunately, is not nearly so benign as a spanking in public. On Friday, June 11, a Palestinian Israeli ran down a couple of cops in the eastern Jerusalem neighborhood of Wadi Joz. The police gave chase to the suspect, Ziad Jilani, and allegedly shot him dead in an alley. Hass, therefore, contends that this was a case of Israeli cops acting as judges, juries, and executioners due to a supposedly common Israeli racial hatred of Palestinians. Furthermore, Hass goes on to inform us, it is precisely because of such racial hatred that many Palestinian Jerusalemites live in poverty.

(Read full post)

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NY Times Defames Israel's Flotilla-Inquiry Commission

Leo Rennert
American Thinker
14 June '10

Israel has created an inquiry commission to probe all the circumstances of a deadly raid on a Turkish ship trying to breach the blockade of Gaza. But before the commission has even begun to do its work, the New York Times already has dismissed it as a worthless "farce" -- and in the paper's news section no less.

Any fair, impartial observer would wait until the commission performs its task and releases its findings. But not the New York Times, which in its superior wisdom already divines that the Israeli commission is a government tool to divert blame elsewhere. Never mind that the Obama White House already has expressed satisfaction with the formation of the commission and views its composition as being able to meet international requirements ''for a prompt, impartial, credible and transparent investigation." The Times knows better and uses its so-called news coverage to dismiss the commission as a rigged affair.

And how does the Times know that? By inserting in its June 14 article about the formation of the commission an attack on the panel by Haaretz, a daily far-left newspaper with limited circulation that consistently blackens Israel's actions and policies. ("Israel Names Panel to Examine Ship Raid" by Isabel Kershner, page A10).

Not surprisingly Haaretz, with its customary bias, published its slanderous accusations against the commission before the commission was even formed! So that ought to tell any fair-minded reporters something about its complete lack of credibility.

But not as far as the Times is concerned. Here is what Kershner filches from Haaretz to drive her poisonous stake into the commission's integrity:

"In an editorial published on Sunday (before four of the five commission members were even known), the liberal newspaper Haaretz said the government's efforts at investigating itself looked increasingly like a 'farce.'"

(Read full article)

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Haaretz contributes to worldwide anti-semitism again

Elder of Ziyon
12 May '10

Ha'aretz has a very peculiar story:

Microbiologists in Israel are preparing for the potential arrival of tourists infected with a lethal fungus, which caused several deaths in the United States and whose source has been linked to an Israeli laboratory in a U.S. report.

The airborne fungus called Cryptococcus gatti has sparked panic worldwide since it was the cause of several deaths on the United States' West Coast.

As panic ensued due to the potential lethal scope of the fungus, last week an American journalist presented a theory that linked Israel to the spread of the fungus.

According to the report, the source of the fungus was in labs where the fungus was being researched in the United States, as well as in the Nes Tziona Biological Institute in Israel.

The report also linked an Israeli American scientist, Dr. Joseph Moshe, to the spread of the fungus.

Moshe was in the media spotlight last year when he was arrested in California last summer for threatening White House officials, after engaging in a police car chase. According to the U.S. media, Moshe researched the fungus in a California lab before his arrest.

Why doesn't Ha'aretz mention the source of this bizarre conspiracy theory?

(Read full post)

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Pollster: Ha'aretz Misrepresented Obama Poll

TS
CAMERA/Snapshots
22 March '10

It seems that we have a Ha'aretz trifecta today (see here and here). In the third strike, the Jerusalem Post reports today ("Haaretz fiddled with Obama poll"):

Haaretz misled readers to give the impression that an overwhelming majority of Israelis see US President Barack Obama as “fair and friendly” toward the country, the newspaper’s pollster, Tel Aviv University professor Camil Fuchs, said on Sunday.

Both the English and Hebrew editions of Friday’s Haaretz led with the headline “Poll: Most Israelis see Obama as fair, friendly toward Israel.” The English edition elaborated near a picture of Obama that “69% say Obama is fair and friendly.”

The story itself gives no numbers, but the lead says “A sweeping majority of Israelis think his treatment of this country is friendly and fair.” The English edition contains no graphic distributing the actual numbers, either online or in print.

The print and online versions of the newspaper’s Hebrew edition included a graphic indicating that just 18 percent of respondents considered Obama “friendly” toward Israel, 3 percentage points fewer than the 21% who called the president “hostile” to the Jewish state.

Ten percent did not know, and 51% defined Obama’s approach to Israel using the Hebrew word “inyani,” which can be translated as “matter-of-fact” or “businesslike,” but not as fair.

Fuchs, who chairs Tel Aviv University’s statistics department, said he received many reactions from people around the world who were surprised by the poll’s headline. He distanced himself from the headline and criticized the way his poll was presented.
“What can I do? Only the editor writes the headlines,” Fuchs said.

(Read full post)
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Ha'aretz Finds Another Jericho Pool

Tamar Sternthal
CAMERA/Snapshots
25 November 09

The swimming pool of the Intercontinental Hotel in Jericho (Photo from Checkpoint Jerusalem blog by Dion Nissenbaum)

Once again, the professional news writers of Ha'aretz contradict their less-than-professional colleagues. Today, Avi Issacharoff reports on the International Conference on Palestinian Prisoners in Jericho held at the "plush InterContinental Hotel," writing:

Several women sat in the courtyard, next to the swimming pool -- the mothers and sisters of Israeli Arabs and East Jerusalemite prisoners. (Emphasis added)

But, wait -- according to Gideon Levy, there's only one swimming pool for Palestinians in the entire West Bank, and that's Banana Land water park (also in Jericho).

Also, on the Ha'aretz front, today CAMERA staff photographed Palestinian private cars, buses, taxis, trucks and pedestrians on Route 505 in the West Bank, which Ha'aretz hasdubbed "an exemplary apartheid road -- for Jews only."

Related: Amnesty's Travesty also Ha'aretz's Ode to an 'Apartheid Road'