CNN responds to false footage charge

Posted to Marxmail by Jose Perez:

[Following the recent spate or repostings of the charge that CNN 
played decade old video claiming it was Palestinians celebrating the 
Sep. 11 attacks, a person named Craig Gingold did the logical thing, 
and wrote CNN. He was immediately answered by the person in charge of 
newsgathering for CNN, Eason Jordan. Gingold asks that his email and 
Jordan's response be circulated to all lists where the charge against 
CNN was aired]

[I do not know Craig Gingold, or if I do I don't recall who he is. 
But I have known Eason Jordan, the executive who answered his email, 
for more than a decade, at least casually, as well as observed his 
work, or the results of it, at fairly close range.

[I'm sure if we sat down to have a philosophical or political 
discussion Jordan and I might disagree on countless topics. But on 
the level of the formal, ethical norms and standards of mainstream 
journalism, nothing I've ever seen him do or say nor anything I have 
ever heard about him would raise the slightest question in my mind 
about taking his probity for granted on an issue like this.

[Jordan is a Georgia native who rose through the CNN. He came into 
CNN in his early 20s and was for five or six years the overnight 
person on CNN's international desk. At the end of the 1980's, as CNN 
grew and its international reporting expanded, he was put in charge 
of the growing international desk, and is especially associated with 
initiatives like making sure CNN kept a reporting presence in Iraq 
throughout the Gulf War and resisting significant pressure from the 
U.S. and its allies in that war to stop reporting Iraq's side of that 
story.

[There would be, undoubtedly, countless things one might criticize 
from a left-wing point of view about this reporting, but even so, it 
must be admitted that CNN covered Iraq's side in that war to an 
extent that was unprecedented in the history of mainstream American 
journalism. Similarly, he was closely associated with things like 
CNN's establishing a bureau in Havana, and was the first journalist 
from a major "Western" news organization to report on North Korea, 
using a small DV cam to record pictures and reporting about the 
famine that country was facing 3 or 4 years back. He has stanchly 
defended CNN's hiring of Palestinian journalists and the airing of 
their work against a barrage of criticism from the Israeli press and 
government. Under Jordan, CNN's international desk became much more 
of a truly international desk, with staff members from all over the 
world, including many from the third world. A number of people that 
came in essentially as person-on-the-lowest-rung on the international 
desk (most famously Christian Amanpour but not just her) have gone on 
to do some of the better on-screen CNN international reporting of 
recent years, despite "funny accents," "bad delivery" and "faces made 
for radio."

[Unfortunately, U.S. viewers get very little exposure to this 
reporting, as the CNN domestic network (the one everyone thinks of as 
"the" CNN although the truth is CNN International has many, many more 
subscribers) no longer carries much of this material, unlike several 
years ago, before Time-Warner acquired Turner broadcasting.

[An interesting question for CNN to ponder might be why what is 
presented as an unsubstantiated rumor was given such credence. I say 
unsubstantiated rumor because the person who made the charge didn't 
even CLAIM to have the proof, and there was a strong suggestion in 
how he wrote about it that he'd never even seen the alleged proof. 
The person who was said to have the proof was an anonymous teacher. 
And on the *substance* of the events, there is no dispute that there 
were initially some expressions of celebration among Palestinians 
when the first reports on the attacks came through.

[I do not believe such a claim would have been as easily accepted 
say, eight or ten years ago.]

[José]

*  *  *

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Craig Gingold" <gingold@sierratel.com> 
To: <change-links@yahoogroups.com>; 
<bay_area_activist@yahoogroups.com> Cc: 
<WILPF-news-us@igc.topica.com>; <hopedance@omnipost.com> 
Sent: Saturday, September 15, 2001 8:00 PM 
Subject: !b_a_Act: CNN Exec Replies to Phony Video Accusation

Over the last several days an extremely alarming email has been 
circulating on virtually every email list in existence, judging by 
the number of copies that I have received. The basic charge is that 
CNN perpetrated a knowing deception of its viewers by airing a 
10-year-old videotape of Palestinians celebrating during the Gulf 
War, but misrepresenting it as showing celebrations of the terror 
attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon. I hardly need explain 
why this is an extremely serious accusation. The implications -- if 
true -- are so disturbing that I felt compelled to make an effort to 
ascertain the veracity of the claim. (The relevant parts of that 
email are at the very end of this posting.)

Given the incredibly wide circulation of the email, and the fact that 
it is based entirely on the unverified assertions of one individual, 
I think it is essential to make a serious effort to determine what 
the basic facts are. Unfortunately, I don't have access to the 
10-year-old tapes cited by the man making the accusation. That would, 
of course, be the most straightforward way to either prove or 
disprove his charges.

The next -- and most obvious -- step to take was to ask for a 
response to this allegation from CNN. Friday afternoon I wrote a 
short letter that I sent by email to CNN, which I made a point of 
CC'ing to the man in charge of news operations, Eason Jordan. 
Somewhat to my surprise, I received a reply from Mr. Jordan before an 
hour had passed -- clearly they are rather concerned to be accused of 
such a blatant deception. His reply is below, followed by my letter 
of inquiry. (I had intended to send this out immediately, but was 
prevented from doing so due to computer problems.)

Unless somebody comes forward with clear and convincing proof that 
CNN really used 10-year-old videotapes, I see no particular reason to 
doubt Mr. Jordan's outline of the facts. In any event, I must confess 
I don't know why it should have been considered utterly unbelievable 
that there would have been *some* Palestinians who did, in fact, 
celebrate the attacks on the United States. Not surprising at all, 
IMO. And hardly surprising that this would be considered newsworthy. 
The real questions are, how widespread were such celebrations, and 
how representative -- or NOT -- were they of overall Palestinian 
reaction to the attacks? And, of course -- did the news reports (on 
CNN and elsewhere) make any real effort to make such assessments?

I know we can never rule out with *100% certainty* the *possibility* 
of such blatant electronic fabrications, but I think we should try to 
avoid the kind of credulous acceptance of unsubstantiated allegations 
that I've observed in this case. Certainly, we need to be vigilant 
against all forms of manipulation. But the real problems we face with 
the mass media are *much* more in the area of framing and context, 
and the suppression of strongly dissenting points of view.

Craig Gingold Midpines CA

**  Please forward this post to any other list where this issue has 
been discussed. **

------- Forwarded Message Follows ------- 
From:               "Jordan, Eason" <Eason.Jordan@turner.com> 
To:                 "'gingold@sierratel.com'" <gingold@sierratel.com> 
Subject:            RE: VERY URGENT: CNN Accused of LYING to viewers 
Date sent:          Fri, 14 Sep 2001 17:00:44 -0400

[Message] From EASON JORDAN, Chief News Executive, CNN:

The suggestion that CNN used 10-year-old images to illustrate 
Palestinians celebrating the terrorist strikes in the U.S. is 
baseless and ridiculous. The videotape was, in fact, shot Tuesday in 
East Jerusalem by a Reuters TV crew and included comments from a 
Palestinian praising Osama Bin Laden, who was not a Gulf War player. 
The more interesting story -- it has the added value of being true -- 
is that Palestinian officials have threatened journalists for taking 
pictures of these Palestinian celebrations. 
____________________________

[Reply to a followup question:]

The videotape was shot on Tuesday, not Wednesday, during daylight 
hours (late in the day but before nightfall). CNN is a responsible 
news organization committed to accuracy and fairness. The sad 
reality, which is indisputable, is some Palestinians celebrated when 
they heard about this horrific tragedy.

@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@

-----Original Message----- 
From: Craig Gingold [mailto:gingold@sierratel.com] 
Sent: Friday, September 14, 2001 4:49 PM 
To: cnn.feedback@cnn.com; Jordan, Eason 
Subject: VERY URGENT: CNN Accused of LYING to viewers

To: Responsible individuals at CNN:

In case you have not yet seen this, I am forwarding for your 
*immediate* attention an email post which is being very widely 
circulated on a large number of email listserves. (This was 
originally posted on the Indymedia website at the URL shown below.) 
The accusation of deliberate and knowing deception on the part of CNN 
is extremely grave. Judging by the positive responses that have been 
posted, and the alacrity with which this post is being forwarded to 
yet other email lists, it is clear that the vast majority of readers 
are giving these allegations uncritical acceptance -- undoubtedly 
because it confirms widespread perceptions of bias and manipulation 
on the part of the mass media.

I urge you to take this matter very seriously, and I hope you will 
undertake an *immediate* investigation of the specific allegation 
that has been made. Most importantly, CNN needs to issue a detailed 
factual response to this accusation AS SOON AS POSSIBLE. A failure to 
to so will only lend more credibility to the allegation.

I hope to hear from someone at CNN some time later today - Friday - 
to confirm that you are in fact undertaking to investigate this 
matter.

Sincerely,

Craig Gingold Midpines CA (209) 742-6802

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

To: Recipient list suppressed <Recipient list suppressed Date: 
Thursday, September 13, 2001 7:35 AM Subject: "CNN USING 1991 FOOTAGE 
of celebrating Palistinians"?

At work on Wednesday we were discussing this. They were showing 
images of the West Bank, of people celebrating in bright sunshine 
when it should have been evening there, if it in fact were live.

================================ 
http://indymedia.org/front.php3?article_id=63288&group=webcast

CNN USING 1991 FOOTAGE of celebrating Palistinians to manipulate you

(english) by Marcio 10:32pm Wed Sep 12 '01 . I'd like to add some 
ideas from here, down south. There's an important point in the power 
of press, specifically the power of CNN. All around the world we are 
subjected to 3 or 4 huge news distributors, and one of them - as you 
well know - is CNN. Very well, I guess all of you have been seeing 
(just as I've been) images from this company. In particular, one set 
of images called my attencion: the Palestinians celebrating the 
bombing, out on the streets, eating some cake and making funny faces 
for the camera.

Well, THOSE IMAGES WERE SHOT BACK IN 1991!!! Those are images of 
Palestinians celebrating the invasion of Kuwait! It's simply 
unacceptable that a super-power of cumminications as CNN uses images 
which do not correspond to the reality in talking about so serious an 
issue.

A teacher of mine, here in Brazil, has videotapes recorded in 1991, 
with the very same images; he's been sending emails to CNN, Globo 
(the major TV network in Brazil) and newspapers, denouncing what I 
myself classify as a crime against the public opinion. If anyone of 
you has access to this kind of files, serch for it. In the meanwhile, 
I'll try to 'put my hands' on a copy of this tape.

But now, think for a moment about the impact of such images. Your 
people is hurt, emotionally fragile, and this kind broadcast have 
very high possibility of causing waves of anger and rage against 
Palestinians. It's simply irresponsible to show images such as those.

<snip non-germane material>

Márcio A. V. Carvalho State University of Campinas - Brazil 

-- 
Louis Proyect, lnp3@panix.com on 09/16/2001

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