Should the Guardian’s Phoebe Greenwood be sacked?

A guest post by AKUS

In the articles ‘Lost in anti-Zionist translation? Guardian misquotes Noam Shalit on Palestinian hostage taking and ‘Guardian corrects story with false translation of Noam Shalit interview after his son’s release CiF Watch exposed the errors in the recent by Phoebe Greenwood article that was corrected:

New headline:

Old headline:

Greenwood’s article was based on an incredibly rude interview carried out by Israeli journalist Amnon Levi of Israel’s “Channel 10”.

Noam Shalit with Amnon Levi of nana 10 – Channel 10

Having watched the interview (in Hebrew) it’s clear that only Amnon Levi and his cameraman were present with Noam Shalit. The interview was taped in Shalit’s house in Mitzpe Hila – in the Shalit’s kitchen, actually.

So Greenwood’s article, with the misleading quotation, was written after reading a translated transcript of the interview. (In a different article about Noam Shalit’s entry into Israeli politics, Harriet Sherwood says she interviewed Shalit in Jerusalem on Monday – presumably May 7th, 2012).

It is an interesting commentary on the low standard of Guardian journalistic ethics that Greenwood, while acknowledging that the interview was taped, does not point out that she was not there.

“Speaking to a television interviewer in the kitchen of the Shalit family home, a familiar backdrop for the Israeli public from the family’s five-year campaign for their son’s release, Shalit was subject to repeated questioning attempting to pin him down on his political policies.”

The Guardian and Greenwood do not acknowledge her source, nor that she, for all intents and purposes, provided a translated transcription of Shalit’s comments lifted from the interview plus her own views about them.

In fact, Greenwood’s article is about as close to plagiarism dished up as journalism as one can get. In another time and at another paper I suspect she would have been sacked.

More from Guest/Cross Post
Response to Lauren Booth
This is cross-posted from the blog, Yaacov Lozowick’s Ruminations. Lauren Booth is...
Read More
Leave a comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *