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Unbeknown to me, George was working on something for GetReligion that was a big picture look about how the New York Times handles the Arab-Israeli conflict. He did an admirable job and I heartily recommend reading that piece.
The New York Times has an extraordinary article that extols the virtues of lying and doublespeak in a recent “Memo from Jerusalem.” Well, you might ask, what of it? How does a dodgy story on the Arab-Israeli conflict fall within the ambit of GetReligion? What is the religion/journalism hook you ask?
Violent, chaotic events are hard for journalists to cover — period. This means it is especially important to pay attention to second-day news reports.
At this point, I am getting very tired of the word “sectarian” in reports from the fiery streets of Cairo.
Anwar al-Awlaki was reportedly killed by a U.S. drone strike on Friday morning. He was as the New York Times describes him “the American-born cleric whose fiery sermons made him a larger-than-life figure in the shadowy world of jihad.”
The Daily Beast, a news and opinion website published by Tina Brown in conjunction with Newsweek magazine, has weighed in on the diplomatic spat between Israel and Turkey. In a piece entitled “The Erdogan Doctrine“, columnist Owen Matthews argues President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his ruling AK Party have been unfairly characterized as villainous Islamist thugs. They have actually sought to build bridges with Turkey’s minority faiths, Matthews argues.
There are two must-read articles on Syria out this week, both containing strong religion-news angles concerning the implosion of Bashir al-Assadâs police state.
It is a principle that has been voiced many times here at GetReligion through the years: If religion is important enough to dominate a story’s lede then religious content should probably be included in the body of the story, as well.
