Did NYT’s Bronner Even Go To a Friday Protest?

You don’t have to look too hard to find salient critiques of New York Times Jerusalem bureau chief Ethan Bronner’s coverage of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

But Bronner really got under my skin with yesterday’s front-page story, “Palestinians Try Less Violent Path to Resistance.” His omissions are legion — most notably that he doesn’t even seem to have bothered to have personally witnessed one of the Friday protests in the West Bank villages whose lands are disappearing behind an Israeli wall.

Max Blumenthal, an independent journalist and LobeLog contributor, covered the protests last year in a video for the Daily Beast. He points out to me in an e-mail that, while “Eitan” Bronner (as he is known in Israeli circles in Jerusalem) posits Hamas as a violent fall back to the protests, he neglects to mention that the towns where the protests take place, Bil’in, Niilin and Jayyous — and where they enjoy widespread popular support — are politically mixed areas, representing Fatah, Hamas, and the PFLP. Hamas is especially powerful in Niilin, he notes.

Max also points to the fact that Bronner doesn’t mention the killing of non-violent activist Bassam Abu Rahmeh (the 18th such death since 2004, activists say), or the maiming of American solidarity activist Tristan Anderson. The former incident was dismissed by authorities in an investigation; the IDF refuses to look into the latter. Both involved the IDF firing tear gas canisters directly at protesters. (Another non-violent activist from Jayyous, Mohammad Othman, was jailed by Israel under “secret evidence” from Sept. 2009 to Jan. 2010.)

Reporters, naturally, are not immune, as their role covering the protests is essential if the movement is to grow and become successful. Last fall, the IDF fired tear gas grenades directly at Al Jazeera English’s Jackie Rowland, despite her being clearly in the process of delivering an on-camera report at the time. There was no rock throwing during this incident.

About those rocks, I don’t mean to dismiss violence of any sort, but hurling an occasional stone at well-armed and armored soldiers — or cutting holes in and destroying sections of a “separation barrier” that violates international and even Israeli law — seems to me to hardly diminish the turn towards non-violence taken by Palestinians to a decades-long military occupation. Contra this, and taking cues from the Israeli military, Bronner emphasizes several times in his piece the minimal violent occurrences.

Bronner’s attempt — though ultimately a failed one — to give some much-needed New York Times attention to the growing movement is admirable. The Times has barely touched these issues, despite the fact that these demonstrations been going on for at least six years, until this year — when Palestinian officialdom truly latched onto them in a bid to increase their dismal legitimacy, with, for example, PA Prime Minister Salam Fayyad showing up in Bil’in during a protest with thousands of on-lookers. (Another Times Israel correspondent, Israeli citizen Isabel Kershner, has done some light reporting on the subject from the West Bank.)

But his approach’s most glaring and tragic flaw is an example of gross journalistic negligence. Bronner seems to have not reported at all from one of the protests themselves, the cradle and nerve center of the non-violent movement. You wouldn’t think it would have been so hard — these demonstrations, after all, go down every Friday. Talk about lacking color (Bronner relies, instead, on things like a billboard) and not taking initiative as a journalist. Certainly, this is lazy reporting. Evidence of bias? I’ll leave that up to you.

Ali Gharib

Ali Gharib is a New York-based journalist on U.S. foreign policy with a focus on the Middle East and Central Asia. His work has appeared at Inter Press Service, where he was the Deputy Washington Bureau Chief; the Buffalo Beast; Huffington Post; Mondoweiss; Right Web; and Alternet. He holds a Master's degree in Philosophy and Public Policy from the London School of Economics and Political Science. A proud Iranian-American and fluent Farsi speaker, Ali was born in California and raised in D.C.

SHOW 9 COMMENTS

9 Comments

  1. As I was getting interested in this issue, I made that very point to an Imam, he listened and agreed, though he didn’t fully express himself. Israel has been very adept at moving the goalpost, at conflating non-violent protest with actual threats, and the Palestinians loose land and rights daily.

    I confronted a Rabbi too. He hardly listened, got belligerent and spit in my face–true story. I wish I had kicked his ass, or called the police and charged him with assault.

    Finally, Israel arrests peaceful Palestinians. The peaceful Bargouti is in Jail the more militant one was on the streets. Jon, you have to give it to the Israelis they have won the PR war IN AMERICA. The rest of the world sees Israel as an expansionist state. But watery headed Americans want their MTV, Happy Meals and their Arabs suppressed.

  2. The Palestinians are choosing peaceful demonstration and organization. Israel’s kicked most of the international media out of Gaza and the area – so getting the full story on this attempted genocide isn’t going to get any easier.

    But yes – the Apartheid campaign is the best hope of pushing Israel to the international consensus. But I’m not holding my breath. I believe one day the west will be at war with Israel – or at least relations will be so bad as to be non-existent. This is truly a fanatical, fundamentalist state.

    There needs to be sanctions against Israel for it’s crimes against the Palestinians and Lebanese. Without some form of international pressure, Israel will continue to keep the Palestinians in concentration camps or work to expel or kill them all.

  3. Jon: Do you seriously believe that Israel’s problem is only with Likuud?

    The ‘world’ has ‘insisted’ on a Palestinian state — many times. Israel’s fundamentalist corner in the western world worked very hard to prevent that from happening. It’s nothing to do with Palestinian tactics. It’s everything to do with Israeli and Israel-supporter actions…

  4. I’m sorry, Stevie, but if you can’t grasp what I’m saying, I can’t help it. I can’t be any clearer.

Comments are closed.