By Brian Carnell

Monday, April 8, 2002

Last week I mentioned that Eric Alterman had inexplicably included Cathy Young in his long lost of journalists who were "reflexively" pro-Israeli. Alterman reacted in anger to one person who e-mailed him asking why she was on the list, so I was curious how Alterman would respond to Young herself. Apparently he just ignored her. Young writes in The Boston Globe,

A few days ago, Eric Alterman, a columnist for The Nation, published an article on MSNBC.com decrying what he regards as the unthinkingly pro-Israeli bent of much of the American punditocracy.

To my shock, I found that his list of "commentators who can be counted upon to support Israel reflexively and without qualification" has my name on it - which is rather baffling, since I have never written about the Mideast. (My e-mail to Alterman was unanswered.) Ironically, the main reason I haven't touched this issue is that my sentiments about it are too ambivalent.

While I am Jewish and have close relatives in Israel, I have always believed that this should not determine my judgment of whose cause is right. As the chilling images unfold on our television screens, I find myself moved and appalled by the human suffering on both sides.

Note that as of April 8, 2002, Young's name is still listed in Alterman's MSNBC column and neither he nor MSNBC have done anything to retract or correct this. I imagine that if somebody on the right produced a list of people who were reflexively pro-Castro and decided to put Alterman on that list and simply ignore all objections, that would go over like a ton of bricks with Alterman and the various Left wing media watchdog groups. Apparently consistency and fairness are something that neither Alterman and MSNBC consider important.

Source:

Wrestling with empathy on Mideast conflict. Cathy Young, The Boston Globe, April 8, 2002.

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