NYT Jerusalem Bureau Chief Compares Treatment of Journalists In Israel To Iran

NYT Jerusalem Bureau Chief Compares Treatment of Journalists In Israel To Iran.(FreeBeacon).By: Adam Kredo.The New York Times’ recently installed Jerusalem bureau chief is once again drawing fire on Twitter for likening Israel to Iran. When approached by the Free Beacon, she defended the comparison.
“What do Israel and Iran have in common? Jailing journalists, according to [the Columbia Journalism Review],” Rudoren tweeted yesterday.
The comment—which immediately elicited a flurry of angry reactions from various pro-Israel forces across Twitter—included a link to a CJR report noting that Israel and Iran respectively place second and third on the list of countries currently incarcerating journalists.
The report itself drew widespread criticism for employing statistical sleight of hand in order to paint a portrait of Israel that does not comport with the facts.
Justin Martin, the report’s author, “avails himself of obviously bad numbers. He relies on an artificial, self-serving, and meaningless definition of ‘per capita,’” wrote Omri Ceren in Commentary. “And he equates twilight totalitarian roundups with open Israeli jurisprudence. For a scholar to publish something like this in an academic outlet is disgraceful, and any CJR editor who touched the post is complicit in nakedly politicizing their journal.”
Rudoren initially defended her tweet, maintaining that the report was noteworthy.
“Just sharing a link that caught my eye,” she tweeted in response to one of her critics.
“Was trying to make a lite point off a tidbit. It’s Twitter, not a dissertation. Others’ analyses also intrstng,” she later added.She then apologized.
“Folks, I tweeted the CJR link w/o reading it carefully (and w/o reading any of the analyses),” the tweet stated. “Apologies.”She maintained that it is perfectly acceptable to make note of the report, even if it was flawed.
“To suggest that noting the existence of a CJR study, even if flawed, is anti-Semitic
seems entirely out of proportion. Anti-Semitism is about intent, right? So the suggestion is that I put the tweet out to hurt/destroy Jews? Seriously? A tweet? It’s a platform for conversation, for sharing information—and, sure, for debunking or critiquing that information,” Rudoren wrote.Read the full story here.