Newspaper Page Text
The Southern Xsraelite
The Weekly Newspaper For Southern Jewry
Our 57th Year
Vol. LVIII Atlanta, (Georgia, Friday, February 12, 1182 No. 7
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‘Pure poison’
ABC’s ‘20/20’ program angers friends of Israel
by Joseph Polakoff
TSI’s Washington corre«pondcnl
WASHINGTON —Portrayal of
life of Palestinian Arabs on the
West Bank and Gaza under Israeli
military administration by ABC-
TV’s “20/20" was described by
friends of Israel as “journalism at
its worst” and “pure poison”
propaganda directed against
Israel. The l.os*Angeles Times, in a
preview of the 16-minute show that
was aired Feb. 4, questioned the
program’s balance. The newspaper
said, “Some will argue with
‘20/20’s’ notion of balance; the
report comes wholly from the
Palestinian point of view.”
Av Westin, ABC’s executive
producer for "20/20" was quoted
in Washjqgton as saying, "It is a
piece done from the point of view
of the Palestinians living under
Israeli occupation. 1 would not say
that this piece ever set out to be one
of those balanced pieces in which
both sides get equal time.”
It was believed here that the
program resulted from pressure
brought to bear on ABC by pro-
Arab sources after its showing in
April last year of “The Unholy
War,” which linked the Soviet
Union and the terrorist Palestine
Liberation Organization. This film
was furiously attacked by pro-
Arab sources as damaging to the
Palestinian cause.
A one-sided pro-Arab television
show on the West Bank and Gaza
also was shown on the Public
Broadcasting Service a year ago
and aroused strong criticism from
friends of Israel. A principal in the
show’s production, John Wallach,
later told The Southern Israelite
that the show was “nor anti-Israel,
it was anti-Begin," in reference to
Prime Minister Menachem Begin
The Jewish Community Council
of Greater Washington, in a letter
to ABC News chairman Roone
Arledge, said the program is
“journalism at its worst” and “falls
short of sound, objective
reporting." Signed by council
President Bert Silver, the letter
said, “No one can disagree that the
realities of the Palestinian
experience living under Israeli
military administration is an
unhappy, dissatisfying one at best
Indeed, the wish to improve those
realities was a central motivation
of the governments of Israel,
America and Egypt in signing the
Camp David accords.
"However,” Silver said, “the
spectfjc issues raised by ‘20/20’ are
complex, hotly politicized ones.
Such issues cannot be fairly
presented from only one
viewpoint. It is difficult to
understand why ‘20/ 20’ was able to
locate Palestinian Arab physicists,
farmers, teachers, physicians,
nurses, political activists and
prisoners—all offering their
personal view —yet was able to find
only one Israeli settler to express
an alternative view, and that for
only a few seconds.”
The first segment of the program
consisted of interviews with
Palestinian Arabs under Israeli
military administration. They
expressed a broad range of
allegations of Israeli legal, moral
and human rights abuses, without
significant challenge by
interviewers and without
presenting alternative views from
Israelis. This, segment was
introduced and followed by a
statement stressing that Israeli
officials refused to be interviewed
or to respond.
The council’s letter to Arledge
said, “The program’s disclaimer
that Israeli governmental officials
refused to respond is immaterial
and therefore misleading. The
Arabs interviewed were not
officials. A balanced report should
have included statements of
private Israelis as counterparts to
private Palestinian Arabs.”
Viewers noted that the Jewish
settlements, for example, were
represented as illegal when in fact
President Reagan, unlike
President Carter, has consistently
pointed out that they are not
illegal. All people—Moslems,
Christians, Jews and others^re
entitled to live on the West Bank
and Gaza. Jewish settlements were
shown to have been built for
security reasons and legal under
international law.
Leaders pleased with Mubarak
on his first visit to Washington
individual with a pleasing style
of his own.
Unusually large numbers
greeted him at the Capitol Some
55 senators lunched with him and
to a meeting. “He did a good job,”
a Middle East specialist at the
Capitol remarked. “He had
tremendous rapport," another
said. The Jewish group was more
a hundred House members came than double the size of those Sadat
had met, and much more
representative of the American
Jewish community.
Mubarak's statements included
assurances to Israel that after April
See Mubarak, page 21
ABC denies plans to air
film on ‘Israeli viewpoint’
“entirely unbalanced” and a “gross
distortion of history.”
According to the reports from
Israel, the network proposed
to produce a new film on the
subject and the prime minister’s
office offered it “every facility and
aid." ABC News, in issuing its
denial, noted that during the
preparation of the segment for last
week's “20/20” program, repeated
requests were made for a
responsible Israeli official to
address the issues raised in the report.
ABC News said it stands by this
broadcast and invites the questions
and comments of the Israeli govern
ment or any other concerned party.
Meanwhile, Ivan Novick,
president of the Zionist
Organization of America, urged
the American public to join in pro
testing the “20/20” segment on
the West Bank broadcast Feb 4 In
a letter to Roone Arledge,
president of ABC News,
Novick urged that it immediately
schedule another segment showing
“the positive side of the issue and
the point of view of the
government of Israel.”
I ast Thursday’s program was
also sharply attacked by the Jewish
Community Relations Council of
New York. George Klein and Jack
Friedgut, chairmen of the JCRCs
Commission on International
Concern, termed the documentary
biased and misleading. In a letter
to Arledge, they said the program
was “a prepackaged presentation
that amounted to little morethana
restatement of Arab propaganda
and accusations.”
President Reagan greets President Mubarak at White House.
by Joseph Polakoff
rsr» Washington correspondent
WASHINGTON In his first
Washington visit as Egypt’s
president, former Air Force
General Hosni Mubarak came
across well as a personality and as
successor to the slain Anwar
Sadat. According to members of
the wide variety of groups he met,
including Senate and House
assemblies, prominent American
industrialists and financiers, and
25 American Jewish communal
leaders, his affability, self-
assurance and sense of humor
created approval of him as an
NEW YORK (JTA)—ABC
News denied Monday that it has plans
to produce a new television film on
the West Bank giving the “Israeli
viewpoint." The denial was issued
following reports from Israel that
an ABC production crew was due
there shortly.
A segment on the West Bank
titled “Under the Israeli Thumb,"
which appeared on the ABC-TV
“20/20" program last Thursday
night, was strongly criticized for
pro-Arab bias by Israeli officials
and friends here and abroad It
reportedly drew expressions of
intense displeasure from Prime
Minister Menachem Begin in
Jerusalem and the Israeli Embassy in
Washington. Shmuel Moyal, press
attache at the Israel Consulate in
New York, called the segment