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ABC pulls out Mideast anchor, NBC may follow

NEW YORK (Hollywood Reporter) - ABC sent its anchor back to New York Wednesday after several days in the Middle East and NBC was apparently leaning that way, although both networks were continuing with their expanded reporting presence in the region.

The Mideast crisis, now in its eighth day, has engaged high-profile journalists like NBC's Brian Williams, ABC's Charles Gibson, CNN's Anderson Cooper and Fox News Channel's Shepard Smith.

NBC and ABC decided late last week to send their anchors, a decision that cost hundreds of thousands of dollars each day. And while they weren't saying how long they would remain in the region, ABC confirmed that Gibson was scheduled to leave Cyprus for New York after Wednesday's broadcast.

It wasn't clear late Wednesday when Williams was going to leave, although it could be as soon as Thursday.

Despite the expense, both networks said it was important for their anchors to go to the story.

"This is an important story. There's a lot of U.S. foreign policy involved in every aspect of this story," said "World News Tonight" executive producer Jon Banner, who was with Gibson. "It deals with Iran and Syria, two countries that are of central interest to U.S. foreign policy. . . . The easiest and best way to do that story is to have your anchor on the scene to explain it to your audience."

Sitting on a concrete slab overlooking the Mediterranean Sea before Tuesday's "NBC Nightly News," Williams said they were playing it day by day but it was important to be there.

"This is why we do what we do. This is one of the things we cover. No one has said a word about cost," said Williams. But there's also a time, executives noted, that having the high-profile anchors on the scene isn't as important.

"Brian is 'Nightly News' managing editor and we very much want him to be at the center of this type of story," said David Verdi, senior vp worldwide newsgathering. "Of course, there's always a critical mass where a story like this will present itself as an ongoing story that will take a lot of time to resolve."

But he, like his counterpart at ABC News, senior vp Paul Slavin, thinks that the on-the-ground perspective is invaluable.

Slavin said the network had kept its options open, but whether Gibson would remain there for a week or more would depend not as much on cost but on what's the best use of resources.

"Having an anchor there is a big deal, and ultimately a strain on the organization," Slavin said. It was, however, Gibson's first foreign trip in the six weeks that he's been permanent anchor of "World News Tonight." Gibson did anchor the network's coverage of the death of Pope John Paul II and the election of the new pope last year for the ailing Peter Jennings.

In an appearance via satellite at the Television Critics Assn.'s summer press tour Wednesday afternoon in Pasadena, Gibson said that he thinks an anchor's role in traveling to a story is important but doesn't want it to interfere with the correspondents on the scene who know the story best.

"Just because the guy is an anchor and flies in doesn't mean he knows it better than the people who are on the ground," Gibson said. "So what's really important is that we do maintain coverage around the world and people around the world and bureaus around the world."

Israel is one of the few places relatively untouched by network budget cuts during the past several decades. Network-news analyst Andrew Tyndall said each of the networks realize that news of the longtime ally, where Americans have family or business ties, is critical. Tyndall also notes that most Americans are familiar with the issues in the Mideast, which makes it easier for networks to tell those stories unlike other parts of the world where the background isn't so well-known.

"It's the tsunami or other natural disaster that gets you to Indonesia, not a political story," Tyndall said. "You don't have to do any of that (explaining) with Israel."

Yet stories from Israel, Tyndall said, have suffered by the enormous commitment that the U.S.-based networks have made to cover the war in Iraq. The amount of airtime the Big Three newscasts devoted to Israel has declined during the last several years.

"Iraq sucks all the oxygen out of the room," Tyndall said.

Reuters/Hollywood Reporter