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Senior CNN executives Richard Davis and Eason Jordan told Israel Insider that their news network had 'made mistakes' but denied that it was biased against Israel.
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| By Ellis Shuman June 24, 2002 |
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CNN Chief News Executive Eason Jordan said his news network had made "inexcusable mistakes," and had presented "incorrect perceptions" of the Middle East conflict, but denied that it was biased against either Israel or the Palestinians in its coverage. After CNN founder Ted Turner equated Israeli military actions with suicide bombers, the company dispatched Jordan to Israel as part of a damage-control mission.
"We're not perfect," Jordan admitted, speaking to Israel Insider staff. "There are things we can do better, and our intention is to be totally fair in our coverage."
An online petition posted on Israel Insider demanded that AOL-Time Warner Chairman Richard Parsons repudiate the remarks of Turner, his vice chairman, and that CNN implement policy changes to more clearly distinguish terrorists and their victims. The petition attracted over 2,000 signatories, each pledging to boycott CNN until corrective actions were taken, cancel AOL subscriptions, and/or sell AOL TW stock. More than 500 site visitors wrote in protest to CNN executives. Within 24 hours, Jordan contacted Israel Insider and requested a meeting.
Jordan arrived in Israel, reportedly his 50th visit to the country, along with Richard Davis, CNN's executive vice president for news standards and practices, following the media focus on Turner's comments, published last week in The Guardian. CNN disavowed connection to Turner's statements, saying that he no longer has any operational or editorial involvement with the channel. AOL-Time Warner issued a similar official statement, although no comment came directly from Parsons.
Days after the Guardian article, Israel's YES satellite television company began broadcasting Fox News as an alternative to CNN. The company said it would not stop broadcasts of CNN and BBC, despite viewers' complaints that both networks provided pro-Palestinian coverage. "We are not censors and will not decide for our subscribers what to see and what not to see," YES CEO Shlomo Liran said in a statement.
The CNN executives met in Israel with leading newspapers, and with Minister of Communications Reuven Rivlin. Rivlin had said that "CNN broadcasts are not only one-sided, they are also laden with anti-Israel propaganda that encourages terror," Ha'aretz reported. Rivlin pledged not to interfere with decisions by YES and Israeli cable companies whether to continue to include CNN in their basic package to subscribers.
CNN to refrain from broadcasting statements of suicide bombers
Last week, Jordan issued an internal memorandum saying, "CNN henceforth will not televise or report on statements made by suicide bombers or their families unless there seemingly is an extraordinarily compelling reason to do so."
When asked what triggered the policy change, Jordan said that it was the result of an "embarrassing mistake" CNN made when broadcasting an interview with Chen Keinan, whose mother and 15-month-old daughter were killed in a suicide bombing in Petach Tikva on May 28. Though aired in its entirety in the United States, the Keinan interview was shortened and replaced by an interview with the mother of a suicide bomber on CNN's network in Europe.
"This kind of mistake was unacceptable," Jordan said. "It is unacceptable to show a perceived moral equivalence between the victims of terror and suicide bombers." The new policy was issued so as not to repeat that kind of error, he said. CNN eventually rebroadcast the Keinan interview in its entirety a few days later.
In an interview with the New York Times, Jordan acknowledged that viewers and government officials in Israel have complained about CNN's coverage in recent months. "Israel has gone through a long period of being terrorized by suicide bombers," he said. "And understandably the Israeli people are edgy right now and sensitive about media coverage."
When asked by Israel Insider staff why CNN had decided to broadcast this week a series on Israeli victims of terror put together by top journalist Wolf Blitzer, Jordan said that the back-to-back suicide bombing attacks in Gilo and French Hill had convinced him that it was important to focus on the human tragedy involved in terror attacks.
Davis added that CNN had broadcast the stories of terror victims in the past, but this was a concentrated effort to show that innocent people were being targeted in acts of terror.
The special television series is complemented by an interactive memorial and timeline of Israeli victims of terror on the CNN website. The brief biographies of hundreds of the victims, including their pictures and the tragic circumstances of their deaths, are included in the online special. "For Israelis, living with terror has become a part of daily life," CNN said.
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