The swamp that is the AP

I understand that almost nobody reads to the end of a news article. I get that you bury information deeply when you don’t want it to be very well noticed. Usually, this works to Israel’s disadvantage, as the anti-Israel media bias spins pro-palestinian on a regular basis.

But here’s what the AP considers a newsworthy explanation of the subject of one of its news articles.

First, the context: The man who would have been the New York City Fire Department’s new Muslim chaplain resigned after Newsday published this quote regarding what he thought about 15 of the 19 hijackers who destroyed the WTC being from Saudi Arabia:

“I’ve heard professionals say that nowhere ever in history did a steel building come down with fire alone,” he told the newspaper.
“It takes two or three weeks to demolish a building like that. But it was pulled down in a couple of hours,” he said. “Was it 19 hijackers who brought it down, or was it a conspiracy?”

So far, so good. But the AP decided they needed to add more information.

Here are the final four paragraphs of the article:

“It’s sad,” said Kevin James, a spokesman for the Islamic Society of Fire Department Personnel. “We had no idea those were his views. He’s entitled to his opinion but he’s not the right person for the chaplain.”

Mayor Michael Bloomberg welcomed Habib’s resignation.

“The remarks were offensive and the mayor is satisfied that the chaplain has resigned,” mayoral spokesman Ed Skyler said.

Some have blamed the destruction of the trade center on a U.S. or Israeli plot designed to whip up support for attacks on Muslim countries. In 2003, New Jersey eliminated Amiri Baraka’s position as poet laureate after he wrote a poem suggesting Israel had advance knowledge of the attacks.

They could easily have ended the story without the final paragraph. But they didn’t. Instead, they mention Israel twice when discussing the fever dreams of the Muslim world. Why, you’d think the AP wants people to think the Jews did it, or something.

Even more interesting, you can read the NY Newsday story on their website, and not once is the word “Israel” mentioned. In fact, the would-be chaplain never mentioned Israel, not in that article, and not in the follow-up piece.

So why, one must ask, did the AP bring it up in the article?

I have my suspicions.

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2 Responses to The swamp that is the AP

  1. Paul M says:

    Meryl,

    Sometimes, I think, you (as in “we”) can try too hard to find problems that aren’t there. It’s tempting with AP, and all the rest of the pack, because they are so often so obviously biased – but this time I think you are reading things into their reporting.

    It’s a matter of opinion, of course, and you may be right and I wrong. Regardless, you should have faith in the majority of Americans, at least, to read that paragraph and see claims of Israeli or US conspiracy for the stupid lies and blame-shifting they are. I don’t think it is a bad thing to remind the public of what so much of the Muslim world is trying to peddle.

  2. Joel says:

    The A.P. like its British cousin Reuters – reflexively looks for an anti-Israel angle even when there is none in the story.

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