ONE MAN’S TERRORIST IS ANOTHER MAN’S FREEDOM FIGHTER, SLIGHT RETURN: CBS News Told Staffers Not To Refer to Hamas as ‘Terrorists.’
CBS News executives cautioned their journalists against referring to Hamas members as “terrorists” in a memo issued the day after the October 7 Hamas attack on Israel, according to the Free Press. It’s the latest embarrassment for the news organization, which is in turmoil amid a daily drip of disclosures about institutionalized anti-Israel bias as well as anti-Trump bias.
Thursday night, the Free Press published an excerpt of an email sent to reporters on October 8, 2023, with the subject, “Standards guidance: Israeli-Palestinian Conflict.”
“Reporting on this weekend’s violence in Israel and Gaza requires a closer look at the language we use when describing events,” the email stated. “For instance, the U.S. government considers Hamas a terrorist organization; however, suggesting an individual is a ‘terrorist’ may be inaccurate depending on the facts.”
The email also noted there are disagreements over whether the attack was “justified” in response to “Israeli occupation of their lands.” The message then said there are “others” who “believe this to be an unprovoked attack on Israel and, as such, Israel has every right to defend itself.”
A source with knowledge of the situation confirmed the guidance to the Sun. They said the goal of the guidance is to avoid generalizations about people in Gaza, such as labeling a doctor or nurse with the Hamas-run Gaza Health Ministry a terrorist without information they engaged in terrorism.
However, even the left-leaning Council on Foreign Relations notes Hamas has “put in place authoritarian institutions” that leave little room for flexibility or the ability to operate independently. Those who step out of line can face harsh punishments.
Additionally, the Israel Defense Forces have released video footage as evidence that Hamas has used civilian infrastructure such as hospitals as “command and control” centers and even possibly to hold hostages from the October 7 attack.
CBS News did not comment on the guidance.
As T. Becket Adams of NRO adds: CBS Makes a Mockery of ‘Standards.’
As incomprehensible as CBS’s approach to these back-to-back issues may be, one should not be surprised. This is hardly the first time the network has played fast and loose with its own unique and, apparently, proprietary set of journalism standards.
Recall that Gayle King, a news anchor, ruffled no feathers on May 26, 2020, when she declared following the death of George Floyd, “I am speechless. I am really, really speechless about what we’re seeing on television this morning. It feels to me like open season . . . and that sometimes it’s not a safe place to be in this country for black men.”
This pronouncement cleared the network’s bar for “impartiality”? Or did management reason that King was exempted from the usual standards regarding personal commentary because she is black, and the news upon which she was commenting involved a black man? If so, does this courtesy not extend to Dokoupil, who, as a Jew, might have a valuable perspective on matters affecting the life and death of Jews, as King presumably did for blacks?
And what are we to make of King’s CBS Mornings interview of the Israeli father of a child taken hostage by Hamas on October 7, in which she said, “Now this seems to be all about politics. What do you say about that? You know, you have innocent children and Palestinians who are dying, innocent Israeli children who are dying. And no one seems to be able to say, ‘Enough, stop that.’” To this, Tom Hand replied, in a tone of anguished exasperation, that he didn’t care about politics, he just wanted his Emily back. CBS’s Standards and Practices and Race and Culture units had nothing to say about this interaction? No all-hands reprimand for King’s “tone”?
The Dokoupil saga will likely get dumber before it eventually blows over. But let’s not lose sight of the big question underlying it. CBS executives claim Dokoupil failed to meet their exacting standards of journalistic excellence. They say this even though his colleagues have grilled guests with objectively inappropriate lines of questions, with zero internal pushback. These executives say this even as 60 Minutes openly violates the network’s interview production and editing standards, with zero explanation or defense provided.
All of this goes back to the underlying question: What standards?
It’s the Calvinball Broadcasting System. But is the clock ticking on its current woke insanity? The joke is on woke CBS News execs as new execs considering ‘blowing the place up.’
What is less public is how all this weirdness is impacting CBS’s future as an ongoing business, and most important, its pending sale to Skydance, an independent studio run by movie producer David Ellison of “Top Gun: Maverick” fame.
David’s dad, Oracle founder Larry Ellison, provides much of the money behind the deal and from what I gather, he’s not too happy about his latest acquisition.
If you don’t know Larry, here’s a primer: He’s one of the world’s richest men, and one of the most pro-Israel executives in corporate America — he’s buds with Israeli Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu.
Let’s just say the people at Skydance and the Ellisons read the newspapers (particularly The Post, which I know for a fact).
They are powerless to do anything about what’s happening at CBS for now; the $28 billion deal to buy the network’s parent Paramount from the controlling Redstone family doesn’t close until sometime in the spring.
But they won’t be powerless for much longer. As one person who knows all the players at CBS’s new owners told me: “They’re thinking about blowing the place up.”
What exactly “blowing the place up” means, no one knows for sure. Will it result in the defenestration of CBS News CEO Wendy McMahon and news-gathering chief Adrienne Roark, both of whom presided over the in-house thrashing of Dokoupil?
Hopefully Ellison won’t be as hands off in shaping CBS News as Jeff Bezos has been while the Washington Post spiraled out of control.
(Classical reference in headline.)