Israel/Palestine
Related: About this forumWhat happens when the IDF embeds Israeli reporters
http://972mag.com/what-happens-when-the-idf-embeds-israeli-reporters/92441/One week after the start of Operation Brothers Keeper, the IDF Spokespersons Unit arranged an opportunity for the Israeli press just in time for the newspapers weekend editions: an opportunity to report from the front lines. Journalists were invited to join military units operating in the Palestinian Authority and to cover the operation to eliminate Hamas infrastructure and the search for the three kidnapped Israelis from up close.
This system, embedded journalism, was the in the past the subject of criticism when the American army made wide use of it during its invasion of Iraq in 2003. The American army continues to use it today in its war in Afghanistan. Coincidentally, criticism of embedded journalism resurfaced last week, just a short time after the three Israeli teens were kidnapped from a hitchhiking post in Gush Etzion, this time in an op-ed by Chelsea Manning (formerly Bradley Manning, who was responsible for leaking the WikiLeaks documents, and who was sentenced to 35 years in prison).
In the op-ed, which was published in the New York Times, Manning wrote about the negative consequences of embedded journalism. Firstly, she wrote, journalists who request to be embedded in a military unity are scrupulously vetted by military officials. Journalists who the army expects to provide favorable coverage are given preferential treatment. At the end of the process, those who are chosen must sign a document, according to which the army can cancel their embedding at will. Reporters naturally fear having their access terminated, so they tend to avoid controversial reporting that could raise red flags, Manning argues. According to her, the framework for embedding journalists often times results in flattery of senior decision makers. As a result, the American peoples access to the facts was seriously harmed.
tech3149
(4,452 posts)Embedded reporters will always be an alternative voice for those in power.
The idea of managed perception has always been the motivating force for embedded reporting. Over the last 15 years the best reporting I've seen has been from independent rogue reporters.
R. Daneel Olivaw
(12,606 posts)I feel the same about independent news and reporting. It's painful to have to accept that truth has become the quaint and fringe in my Democracy.
tech3149
(4,452 posts)I get most of my information from those commie, pinko, listener supported stations or international sources like France 24. I was always pretty much apolitical but 2003 was a turning point for me. I was tired of being lied to and knew that more accurate information was out there if I just invested the time and energy to find it.
My family thinks I'm nuts for investing so much time trying to learn what's really going on in the world but I couldn't see myself doing anything else.
Just wish there were more people I talked to that could absorb some of that information.