Journalists are Under Fire for Telling the Truth...

Journalists are Under Fire for Telling the Truth
by Robert Fisk

First it was Roger Ailes, the chairman of the Fox News Channel, who advised the US President to take the "harshest measures possible" against those who attacked America on 11 September, 2001.

Let us forget, for a moment, that Fox News's Jerusalem bureau chief is Uri Dan, a friend of Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and the author of the preface of the new edition of Sharon's autobiography, which includes a revolting account of the Sabra and Chatila massacre of 1,700 Palestinian civilians and Sharon's innocence in this slaughter. Then Ted Koppel, one of America's leading news anchormen, announced that it may be a journalist's duty not to reveal events until the military want them revealed in a new war against Iraq.

Can we go any further in journalistic cowardice? Oh yes, we can. ABC television announced, a little while ago, that it knew all about the killing of four al-Qa'ida members by an unmanned "Predator" plane in Yemen but delayed broadcasting the news for four days "at the request of the Pentagon." So now at least we know for whom ABC works.

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http://commondreams.org/views02/1218-01.htm

ummm, this guy sounds a bit pissed and very biased in my personal opinion.

I have no issues with our media holding back certian things are the behest of our gov't, especially when it comes to troop movement and layout. A case book example of WHY this should happen was the beach raid on Somalia where the media came with the troops broadcasting live. Some genius at the villiage was watching American news, saw something that he recognized on the television and proceeded to call the troops out and beat down our forces. That was irresponsible journalism in my view and is a reason the media in general is watching what they says about the military right now. Also in the Gulf War it's a WELL known fact that Sadaam got better intelligence on our military from CNN than he did from his own people. Do we really want our media doing intelligence work for opposing forces?

Other than that this guy sounds kind of anti-semetic to a certian degree but I can't really speak on that as I have never seen any of his other published works.

Oh, and I don't think you can say those Al-Qaida folks were "murdered" considering we are in an armed conflict with them.



El Diablo