Monday, March 14, 2011

Ha'aretz vs Ma'ariv and Yediot


This kind of really struck me. These are photos of Ma'ariv, Yediot and Ha'aretz's front-page from today. Ma'ariv and Yediot have a whole page dedicated to the terror attack in Itamar, and at the bottom a banner about the earth quake in Japan. Ha'aretz did the opposite. Their top title is about Japan, and the next article is about Itamar, with no commentary.

I'm not belittling the scope of the tragedy in Japan. I'm sure in the wider scheme of things Japan's tragedy is the bigger story. However for an Israeli paper to choose to put Japan above (and bigger then) a terrorist attack in their own country - especially given the gruesome nature of the attack, is either really bad taste or just a reflection of how disconnected they feel from the those murdered and the public they represent. This is probably as good a sign as any that Ha'aretz is the paper of a very small and elitist public.

It is a real shame that this is the paper most read by the international community.

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