Palestine Pete: Jennings and the Palestinians

Published: 4/22/2002 8:50 PM ET

Palestine Pete: Peter Jennings and the Palestinians

Peter Jennings has demonstrated a pro-Palestinian bias in Middle East coverage for years.

How many years? The award-winning HBO documentary One Day in September focused on the murder of Israeli athletes by Palestinian terrorists at the 1972 Olympics. The documentary included on-scene reports from Jennings, then an ABC correspondent. According to Tom Shales, The Washington Post's television critic, Jennings never used the word "terrorist" in any of the clips in September, referring to the Palestinian gunmen as guerillas, and on one occasion, commandos.

Little has changed since 1972. Jennings still displays more sympathy for the Palestinian cause than Israeli security and shows a penchant for ignoring unpleasant facts, as the following documentation demonstrates.

April 22, 2002 - CyberAlert

ABC covered pro-Palestinian rally in Washington, D.C. but Jennings ignored a pro-Israeli rally held six days earlier.

April 16, 2002 - CyberAlert

Jennings' pro-Palestinian stance illustrated by a one-day comparison of ABC, CBS and NBC coverage from Israel and the West Bank.

April 12, 2002 - CyberAlert

Jennings neglected to mention that a Saudi Arabian telethon was providing money for the families of homicide bombers, something widely reported by other media.

April 5, 2002 - CyberAlert

Examining some of the Palestinian connections from Jennings' years in the Middle East.

April 3, 2002 - CyberAlert

All of the previous day's dozen casualties were Palestinians, Jennings noted. Did not mention that one death was a homicide bomber - the seventh in as many days - who accidentally detonated his bomb and killed himself before he could murder Israeli civilians.

April 3, 2002 - CyberAlert

Jennings said United States was "more or less alone" in its support of Israel and follow-on reports noted anti-Israel protests throughout Europe.

March 29, 2002 - CyberAlert

Reporting from Beirut, Lebanon, Jennings interviewed the leader of Hezbollah, who denied that Hezbollah was a terrorist organization. Jennings noted that Hezbollah was an important political player in Lebanon and mentioned both the U.S. Marine barracks bombing and the U.S. Embassy bombings in Beirut in 1983 but did not point out that Hezbollah was responsible for the attacks.

ALSO:

April 4, 2002 - Media Reality Check

"Deploring Terror-fighters, not Terrorists." Jennings' Hezbollah comments are explored along with other comments from Bryant Gumbel of CBS and Charles Gibson and Terry Moran of ABC.

ALSO:

April 18, 2002 - CyberAlert

CBS willingly admits Hezbollah is terrorist group. Dan Rather introduced Hezbollah interview by noting: "Until September 11th, Hezbollah was responsible for the largest number of Americans ever killed in a terrorist attack, 241 Marines in Lebanon in 1983."

December 5, 2001 - CyberAlert

Hamas is a terrorist group to every anchor but Jennings.

December 5, 2001 - CyberAlert

Jennings described retaliation to terror bombings as Israel being "on the attack again."

December 4, 2001 - CyberAlert

Jennings called Hamas an "organization" that Arafat may not be able to control.