Sunday, November 27, 2005

HaAretz: Dislike the Media? You must be a Radical Fanatic.

In a hatchet job against Kibbutz Sha'alvim, the HaAretz newspaper tries to show us that this kibbutz has turned into a monstrous den of right-wing fanatics. Ordinarily, a newspaper would try to bring objective facts to the table -- at least in the first paragraph. Yet the way HaAretz reports the news, they first shoot an arrow and then draw the target around it, "cleverly" showing how top notch their reporting is.

The article states:

עד לאחרונה נחשב שעלבים לקיבוץ מתון. היום, חצי שעת נסיעה מירושלים או תל אביב, ההרגשה היא שאתה חוצה גבולות ונמצא באחת מההתנחלויות היותר קיצוניות בשומרון. השנאה לתקשורת בולטת, הפרנויה שולטת ואדם הבא מבחוץ ונראה כאיננו שייך למקום, נתפס בקלות כאיום


"Till recently, Shaalvim was considered a moderate kibbutz. A 30 minute drive from Jerusalem or Tel-Aviv, the feeling is that you pass a border and are found in one of the most radical settlements in the Shomron. The hatred towards the media is pronounced, paranoia rules, and any arriving outsider is automaticaly suspect as a threat."

HaAretz wants its readership to know the following "facts"
  1. Shaalvim gives you the feeling of being in a different country. (or political entity)
  2. If you hate the media, (or don't subscribe to HaAretz) you are a radical right wing fanatic.
  3. HaAretz is very good at doing hatchet jobs against anyone who has a different viewpoint than their own, so if you are paranoid they will write something bad about you, you are probably correct (which also makes you a radical right wing fanatic).

3 comments:

Cosmic X said...

Ha'aretz is Israel's version of The New York Times. That's not a compliment!

JoeSettler said...

I would have said more like "The Nation".

The NYTimes at least makes an attempt to appear neutral in it's articles.

orthomom said...

Another part of the article I found telling is that the facts simply don't add up. Did you notice that while trying to use opinions from those who live in the Kibbutz as indicative of the opinions held by those in the Yeshiva proper, they neglect completely to address Nof Ayalon - where many more people have strong connections to the Yeshiva than in the Kibbutz. The fact that they don't even mention the neighborhood - where most students, Rabbis and administrative staff from the Yeshiva live, shows either a basic lack of research on the part of Haaretz, or worse, a willful distortion of the truth.

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