Comments on: The Reuters anti-Israel bias

By: Paul

Paul — Fri, 03 Nov 2006 09:14:06 +0000

To my mind the media (in genearl) has an anti-Israel bias and to be quite candid I do not trust their “journalistic” efforts in the reportage of hard news !!

By: Michael Lonie

Michael Lonie — Fri, 03 Nov 2006 04:02:39 +0000

L’il Mamzer,
Well if they were Jews like Antony Loewenstein, Tony Judt or George Soros it would probably be even worse.

By: Lil Mamzer

Lil Mamzer — Thu, 02 Nov 2006 18:24:29 +0000

Makes me wonder how bad the anti-Israel bias would be if the media weren’t controlled by Jews after all.

/sarcasm

By: Houston

Houston — Thu, 02 Nov 2006 17:27:53 +0000

Meryl,

Hang in there. The job you are doing is one which spreads the word about the biases of the media. You are figting the good fight by getting the information out there.

At least now with the internet, we can share information so responsible people can research different sources and make INFORMED decisions based on FACTS instead of being spoon fed what they should think by networks trying to sell the sexy news.

By: Meryl Yourish

Meryl Yourish — Thu, 02 Nov 2006 16:58:16 +0000

Cite a source or two about those “distortions,” please. I have given you three different media outlets that prove my case that Reuters is deliberately mislabeling the number of terrorists killed as “more than half” when it is more accurately “most” of the people killed.

If you’re going to make a charge like that, you need to back it up with facts.

By: Lee

Lee — Thu, 02 Nov 2006 16:47:37 +0000

I think one reason for reuters’ hesitancy is because Israel has in the past distorted the militant/civilian status of those that it injures or kills. Especially during the last intifada.

Granted this is often a difficult distinction to make, but in such situations I would think it would be better to err on the side of conservatism (i.e. more than half). There are risks in both directions. If you under-represent the militant levels killed then I guess you risk under-representing the accuracy and efficiency of the israeli army. But if you over-represent, you make the opposite error.

By: Meryl Yourish

Meryl Yourish — Thu, 02 Nov 2006 14:54:37 +0000

Andrew, these guys do, regularly. I'm working on a different angle myself, but I have a bit of work to do before I can mention it.

By: Andrew

Andrew — Thu, 02 Nov 2006 14:31:17 +0000

I’m sure this is a stupid question, but Meryl, have you ever shot off an email to someone at the AP or Reuters and asked about some of these things?

It’s not like you’d get them to completely change their philosophy, or that the editor you reached would convince you of anything, but there’s an outside chance of a decent dialogue. I for one would be interested in hearing a response.

All of the above is worthless, of course, if you have emailed them before.

By: Veeshir

Veeshir — Thu, 02 Nov 2006 14:25:52 +0000

They also usually note that the Israeli was “lightly-wounded” by some rocket attack. The Palestinians are never “lightly-wounded”.