Love of the Land: How Bad is the Quality of Media Coverage? A Small Example

How Bad is the Quality of Media Coverage? A Small Example

Barry Rubin
The Rubin Report
13 March '10

Here's an example of just how bad media coverage is. I'm not writing this as an example of anti-Israel media bias but of just poor reporitng which applies to lots of other stories.

1. Lack of understanding

Shas is a populist party whose constituency is poor Orthodox Jews of Middle Eastern origin. A Shas minister announced housing construction in such a neighborhood. He couldn't care less about international issues or the fact that it was five blocks across the pre-1967 border. He just wanted to show his constituents he was providing apartments for them.

Failing to understand this, prestigious Western media outlets claimed this showed how Israel was thumbing its nose at the US by the timing, Israel didn't want peace, etc. They didn't understand what was going on despite their highly paid correspondents, local stringers, pompous belief in their own brilliance, etc.

If they can't understand party patronage politics in a democratic society how the heck are they going to cover societies far more different from their own?

2. Short memory

A few weeks ago, Israel announced it was going to continue construction in east Jerusalem while stopping it elsewhere.

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Love of the Land: How Bad is the Quality of Media Coverage? A Small Example