By Brian Carnell

Monday, April 1, 2002

Eric Alterman believes that American media are by and large biased toward Israel and against the Palestinians. To this end, Alterman recently wrote a column for MSNBC which consisted largely of a list of individuals and publications that "can be counted upon to support Israel reflexively and without qualification." Alterman did throw in a list of a handful of people who he thinks criticize both sides equally (conveniently throwing himself in with that group), as well as listing five columnists "likely to be reflexively anti-Israel and/or pro-Palestinian regardless of circumstance."

Normally the most interesting thing about Alterman's article would be its rank hypocrisy. When conservatives go around making such lists, of course, it is a right wing threat that borders on censorship. When the American Council of Trustees and Alumni issued a report highlighting statements from left/liberal professors about the Sept. 11 attacks, for example, this was denounced in The Nation as an "enemy's list" and as a classic "McCarthy-ite" technique. When the list markers are on the Left, however, these sort of things go largely unnoticed.

In the world inhabited by the Left, when ACTA argues that campus discourse is dominated by anti-American Leftists, this is denounced as McCarthy-style tactics, while Alterman's assertion that the media's discussion of Israel is dominated by anti-Palestinian conservatives will hardly generate any controversy at all. I don't happen to think either of these statements are accurate, but the point is that any time the Right tries to make these sort of claims, it is inevitably labeled as being censorious or McCarthy-ite for doing exactly the same thing that the Left does.

But even worse is that Alterman continues his reign of error in making his list. Alterman seems to have a lot of problems getting his facts straight lately. Either he has made an error or has a very odd criteria for inclusion because near the bottom of the list of reflexively pro-Israeli commentators, he lists Reason Magazine's Cathy Young.

Now, I've been reading pretty much every word written by Young over the last five years, and not only is she not reflexively pro-Israeli, but I can't remember a single column she ever devoted to Israel. The only time Young ever refers to Israel is for matters unrelated to the Palestinian conflict, such as whether or not the high gun ownership rates in Israel affect that nation's crime statistics.

There are two obvious explanations that jump out to explain this, neither of which say much about Alterman's habits.

The less insidious explanation is that he listed Cathy Young but actually meant reporter Michael Young who has written extensively about Israel (though is hardly reflexively pro-Israeli), and is a contributing editor at Reason. This sort of mistake would fit in with Alterman's sloppy habits in the past and his apparently disdain for fact checking.

A more insidious possibility is that Cathy Young was listed because she happens to be a prominent conservative Jewish pundit.

Either way, Alterman has some explaining to do.

Source:

Intractable foes, warring narratives. Eric Alterman, MSNBC, March 28, 2002.

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