CAMERA (Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America) - "Committee for the Accuracy of Reporting Events in the Middle East in America." American nonprofit pro - Israel press monitoring organization.
It was created in 1982 in order to “respond to the coverage by the Washington Post of the Israeli invasion of Lebanon and the general anti-Israeli deviation of the newspaper” [1] .
The goal of CAMERA's activities is to clarify controversial issues and expose negative propaganda (against Israel) [2] [3] [4] [5]
The organization produces reports whose goal is to combat “often inaccurate and distorted characteristics of Israel and the events in the Middle East,” which in its opinion can strengthen anti-Israeli and anti-Jewish prejudices [6] .
CAMERA criticism
The group organizes protests against the “dishonest”, in its opinion, press coverage of the Arab-Israeli conflict . For this purpose, she publishes full-page advertisements in newspapers [7] , organizes demonstrations and encourages media sponsors to stop funding them. CAMERA has over 55,000 members [8] making membership fees. According to the organization, more than 46 media outlets printed at its request clarifying information to published articles [9] .
CAMERA criticized for “distorted lighting” in particular:
- Microsoft Encarta Encyclopedia. According to CAMERA, the authors of the encyclopedia illegally balanced the violence on the part of the two sides during the Arab-Israeli conflict. The information in Encarta is a “problematic mixture of bias and error” [10]
- Steven Spielberg's film "Munich" . According to CAMERA, the film portrays Israel’s actions as “wrong, bloody and counterproductive” and promotes “Israel’s guilty thesis” [11]
- CNN Broadcasting Company [12] , Los Angeles Times [13] and Israeli Haaretz [14] .
CAMERA Organization Criticism
Gershom Gorenberg, an Israeli correspondent for The American Prospect magazine, wrote that the name of the organization reminds him of “names from Orwell” [15] and that “like other organizations engaged in wars of various narratives, CAMERA does not realize differences between accuracy and propaganda ” [16] . Other sources describe CAMERA as a special lobbying group [17] , advocating pro-Israeli bias in the media [18] .
CAMERA Wikipedia Activities
In April 2008 , the pro-Palestinian website Electronic Intifada discovered the Google discussion group created by CAMERA [19] [20] .
The group’s stated purpose was “to help protect Wikipedia articles related to Israel from anti-Israeli editors” [21] . In addition, Electronic Intifada stated that it got into its hands a copy of the correspondence between the members of the group (according to her statement, one of the participants gave this copy), in which they planned their activities. The alleged correspondence, in particular, contained plans to promote participants in administrative positions by editing neutral articles and gaining trust among project participants. Then, it was planned to use administrative powers in the process of editing controversial articles on Arab-Israeli topics. The representative of CAMERA refused to confirm or deny the authenticity of this correspondence [16] .
Electronic Intifada accused CAMERA of "organizing a secret long-term campaign to infiltrate Wikipedia with the goal of" rewriting Palestinian history ", using crude propaganda instead of facts, penetrating its administrative structures to ensure that these changes go unnoticed or as objectionable" [22] .
In May 2008, on the English Wikipedia [23] , despite the objections of a number of participants in the discussion, 5 users were blocked, accused of organizing a secret CAMERA campaign to edit articles related to Israel and the Arab-Israeli conflict. According to the decision of the group of administrators of English Wikipedia, the principles of Wikipedia as a free project "are fundamentally incompatible with the creation of a private group whose purpose is the secret coordination of editing by people with the same ideological principles." [21]
At the same time, Andre Oboler, a representative of NGO Monitor, noted that several pro-Palestinian groups “Wikipedians for Palestine” operate on Wikipedia in this way, but their activities are not prohibited [24] . In response, one of the founders of the Electronic Intifada website, Ali Abunima, stated that his group had never distributed such emails [21] .
Links
Notes
- ↑ "A brief history of CAMERA"
- ↑ Manfred Gerstenfeld and Ben Green. Watching the Pro-Israeli Media Watchers . Jewish Political Studies Review . 16: 3-4 (Fall 2004).
- ↑ Murdoch, Son Differ Sharply Over Israel
- ↑ Lando, Michal . Israel critique on campus , Jerusalem: Jerusalem Post (November 4, 2007). (inaccessible link)
- ↑ Rob Eshman . Butt out , Los Angeles: Jewish Journal (January 25, 2008).
- ↑ CAMERA: About CAMERA
- ↑ US newspapers catching flak for Mideast war coverage: Media caught in the cross fire as both sides complain of bias
- ↑ CAMERA: Fighting Distorted Media Coverage of Israel and the Middle East, An Interview with Andrea Levin, 1 June 2005
- ↑ CAMERA: Corrected (inaccessible link) . Date of treatment January 26, 2010. Archived November 25, 2009.
- ↑ "Microsoft's Encarta Muddles the Middle East," Jerusalem Post February 12, 2004, CAMERA May 26, 2006.
- ↑ "File Review of Munich: Spielberg and Kushner Smear Israel," CAMERA December 21, 2005, accessed May 18, 2006.
- ↑ CAMERA : At LA Times, Obscured Targets
- ↑ CAMERA : Who Broke the Ceasefire? CNN's “Fact Check” Falls Short
- ↑ CAMERA : Pulse on Gaza's Medical Situation
- ↑ The American Prospect : J Street on the Map
- ↑ 1 2 Gorenberg, Gershom. The Mideast Editing Wars. The American Prospect , May 1, 2008.
- ↑ Mark Jurkowitz, "Blaming the Messenger: Archived February 13, 2009. (unreachable link from 06-15-2013 [2264 days] - history , copy ) When the Pro-Israeli Group CAMERA Sees News from the Middle East That It Deems Unfair Or Wrong, It Targets the Media-And Doesn't Let Go, " Boston Globe Magazine February 9, 2003: 10, History News Network ( George Mason University ) April 24, 2006.
- ↑ Robert I. Friedman. The lobby: Jewish political power and American foreign policy. The Nation 244. (June 6, 1987)
- ↑ Halper, Jeff. A Strategy within a Non-Strategy: Sumud, Resistance, Attrition, and Advocacy (Eng.) // Journal of Palestine Studies : journal. - 2006. - Vol. 35 , no. 139 . - P. 45 . - DOI : 10.1525 / jps.2006.35.3.45 . Archived on March 17, 2007.
- ↑ George S. Hishmeh, Activists under cyber-attack in internet propaganda war Archived August 22, 2009 by Wayback Machine , The Daily Star (Lebanon), Monday, November 11, 2002.
- ↑ 1 2 3 Beam, Alex War of the virtual Wiki-worlds . The Boston Globe . The New York Times Company (May 3, 2008). Date of treatment May 4, 2008. Archived February 2, 2009.
- ↑ "Pro-Israel group's plan to re-write history on Wikipedia." [1] . Electronic Intifada April 21, 2008
- ↑ See also discussion:: en: Wikipedia: Administrators' noticeboard / Incidents / Wikilobby campaign discussion on Wikipedia
- ↑ The Jewish Week : "Latest Front In Mideast Wars: Wikipedia"