From vile to mild [Coverage of protest waters down hate]

Toronto Sun ^ | 2010-04-10 | Michael coren

[Clive]

Last week saw the festival of Passover, commemorating the freedom of the Jewish people as they fled persecution. It is a mixture of the sweet and the bitter, as has been the last six decades of the life of Israel, the reborn Jewish state.

Interesting that Palestine House, the centre of Canada’s Palestinian community, should use this time to bring in British-based journalist Abd al-Bari Atwan. In 2007, he said on television that, “If the Iranian missiles strike Israel, by Allah I will go to Trafalgar Square and dance with delight.” In fact the man is renowned for such dangerous rhetoric.

Protest predictable

The merit of this publicly funded organization importing such a man aside, it was predictable that Jewish organizations would protest. And this is where it all becomes deliciously interesting and indicative. There are numerous videos and eyewitness reports on the Internet of what occurred and it’s pretty vile stuff.

The protesters chanted mildly that they liked Palestinians but hated terror and called for an end to jihad, but not the young men who had assembled outside Palestine House to support the speaker. They screamed that the world needs “another Holocaust”, shouted that, “We love jihad, we love killing you”, they threw pennies on the ground — all Jews are cheap moneygrabbers you see — and gave us, “We love killing dogs... your bitches with you. What do your women taste like?”

But all is OK because the media was present. Welcome to young Denise Balkissoon, covering the event for the Toronto Star. She’ll get to the truth of it all and expose the bigots. “Each group accused the other of hate, shouting go home”, she wrote in the Star. “JDL (Jewish Defence League) members hurled overt racist slurs, while Palestine House men threw pennies on the ground, calling the JDL thieves.”

Jarring discrepancy

Then on her Twitter account the ace reporter opined, “Finally, after a day covering a storey of petty racism, made it to The Runaways.” Yes, she did spell “story” as “storey”. Apart from the dreadful spelling and insulting sense of priorities, there is a jarring discrepancy between what is to be seen on footage of the protest and what the Star described as two groups of people acting with equal nastiness.

Is she being balanced, is she informed? In an unintentionally hilarious interview with the leader of the Jewish protest, Ms. Balkissoon asks the yarmulke-wearing man why he is there on a Friday and not a Saturday. As if helping out a child, the man explains that he is Jewish and the Jews have a Sabbath and, well, you know the rest. This, by the way, from a woman who describes herself as, “culturally savvy”. Mind you, in the same biography she boasts of being a good editor!

While the Jewish group probably did shout for their opponents to go home — the guest speaker was visiting after all — and may even have mentioned a camel (my golly, the horror) — it’s not quite the same as calls for a second Shoah, the unzipping of pants, the obscene misogyny and the racist threats. Odd and one-sided reporting of the Middle East and its Canadian context. Now there really is a story/storey.

Read Michael Coren’s new blog here.

[Clive]

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