Newsweek Lies, People Die
In last week's issue, Newsweek magazine published its weekly defense of the poor misunderstood jihadists currently detained at Guantanamo Bay. This has long been a regular feature in the magazine (scanning the table of contents, you can usually find the "More Allegations of Abuse at Gitmo" article tucked snuggly between the letters to the editor and the movie reviews), but this time, the article set off a deadly chain of events that provoked riots throughout the Muslim world, killing 15 people and injuring hundreds more.
Newsweek published allegations that US interrogators were flushing copies of the Quran down the toilet in order to break the will of terrorist suspects. A radical Islamist leader in Pakistan promptly held a news conference denouncing the US for this unfathomable act of disrespect against Islam. The Muslim world was enraged at the article's allegations. Riots broke out in Afghanistan, and violence soon followed. The Pentagon denied the veracity of the article, but it was only a trickle caught in a flood of holy anger directed towards the US.
But now Newsweek has admitted that the story was in error; they cannot back up the claim that US interrogators desecrated the Quran. Oops, sorry.
posted by James Edens at
6:03 PM
6 Comments:
James,
Why is it you conveniently fail to mention that Newsweek submitted this story before it was published for review by Pentagon officials, who did not question the allegation - until 10 days after it was published?
And, really, is the story so far-fetched, given what we know soldiers have done in order to "break the will" of terrorist suspects, and other random detainees at Abu Ghraib? (most of whom it turns out were guilty of nothing but being in the wrong place when American troops were rounding folks up - oops, indeed.)
Dan,
The attitude at a influential and generally respected newsmagazine such as Newsweek should not be "stop us before we publish unsubstantiated and inflammatory material!" Of course the Pentagon should have caught the weakly sourced claim, but the responsibility to verify sources must lie with the reporter, not some press secretary.
You also seem to be saying that even if the Koran-desecration charge cannot be verified, it is probably true anyway. This is similar to CBS' infamous "fake but accurate" defense of the forged memos. I'm not saying the charge is beyond belief, but I am saying that if Newsweek or anyone else is going to publish inflammatory accusations that could enrage the Muslim world and set back years of diplomatic efforts, they'd better make sure they have their facts straight first.
The Newsweek debacle also illustrates another problem: Major news stories are all too often based on rumor, not fact. Eric Alterman, of all people, said it best:
"Even the best of our journalism is incredibly lightly-sourced. It’s amazing to me that an organization like Newsweek would go to press with so crucial a story on the basis of so little. Think of all the people who had to read this item before it passed into print. Not one of them appears to have guessed at its import and asked the tough questions of Mike Isikoff, who, as we all know, has displayed an extremely unhealthy willingness to be guided by sources of a nefarious nature in the past. And yet this story, true or not, was sourced lighter than air...We we see just how easy it is to print fiction in the guise of high-minded, fact-checked journalism."
But WHY didn't the Pentagon catch this if it was so weakly sourced? If it was SO against established policy, and so demonstrably untrue, as the White House claims, why didn't anyone at the Pentagon raise a flag when they had the chance?
Frankly, we're getting past the point where pointing out that there is a concerted right-wing effort to discredit the mainstream media should be necessary.
And I don't doubt that Karl Rove and friends would go to any lengths necessary to accomplish such an aim.
Did you listen to Rush today? He all but called - strike that - he essentially called - strike that he DID call mainstream media traitors.
That's what the Republican establishment wants the general public to believe about the one independent check remaining on their power.
Surprising?
Not to me.
Insulting?
Absolutely.
Dan, you're trying to shift blame away from Newsweek for its shoddy reporting and turn this into a Bush/Rove scandal, all because some Pentagon official didn't do Newsweek's fact-checking for them.
I'm not a Rush listener, and I wouldn't call the mainstream media "traitors," but there is no denying that the media are often deeply antagonistic and suspicious toward the military, as ABC's Terry Moran admitted recently. This pre-existing bias makes it almost inevitable that incidents similar to the Newsweek debacle will happen again.
Rove doesn't need any master strategy to destroy the credibility of the mainstream media. The mainstream media is doing that well enough on their own.
A pity someone hasn't updated this story, to point out that Newsweek wasn't wrong at all in describing the abuse of the Koran. The Pentagon issued a news release, albeit, on a Friday night, to admit as much.
Yeah, it turns out the Koran has indeed been abused at Gitmo...mostly by the detainees themselves. But let's not miss this opportunity to engage in another round of self-flagellation, right?
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