Journalist: NBC News promotes ‘blood libel’ following Corrie verdict
JERUSALEM — An Israeli civil court ruled last week that Rachel Corrie’s death was an accident, citing poor visibility that precluded the bulldozer driver from discerning Corrie’s presence.
Yet this has not stopped the Western media from promoting the canard that Corrie was “intentionally murdered.”
In reporting on the verdict, NBC News published a photo, with caption, showing Corrie standing in plain view of an Israeli bulldozer, with a megaphone in hand — making it difficult to believe that the Israeli driver did not see her. Indeed, the wording of the NBC News caption — “before she was killed in Rafah” — emphasizes the idea that at the moment Corrie was crushed, she was clearly visible, standing with a megaphone.
Yet this is a total lie.
The truth is that this photo was taken hours before the incident. At the time of the accident, Corrie was without a megaphone and was in a hidden position.
Another photo, taken minutes after the accident, shows Corrie bleeding on the ground.
Any honest journalist can see that this second photo shows a different bulldozer. Note the large mud spot on the right side of the bulldozer’s blade, in contrast to the “megaphone photo.” Additionally, this second bulldozer has smaller windows and an 8-foot-tall bulldozer blade that greatly obscures driver visibility.
The misleading NBC News photo and caption cannot be passed off as merely an honest mistake. Nine years ago, CNN, The New York Times and others made this exact same “mistake” — and were forced to issue retractions.
Yet the news media — due either to anti-Israel bias, or to pure sloppiness — continues to promote the blood libel of Israel intentionally murdering Americans.
Two days after I complained to NBC News, I was contacted by an editor at the news network saying they’d changed the caption from “before she was killed” to “on the day she was killed.”
Yet by this time the damage was done and NBC readers had already moved on. So while truth prevailed in the Israeli court, we await the day when the truth will likewise triumph in the court of world opinion.
(Shraga Simmons is a journalist who writes on media bias relating to the Middle East conflict. He holds a degree in journalism from the University of Texas and served as the founding editor of the media watchdog, HonestReporting.com. He is the author of the book, “David & Goliath: The Explosive Inside Story of Media Bias in the Mideast Conflict.”)
comments