Tuesday, April 17, 2007

NUJ Israel Boycott Action Criticized

Melanie Phillips rounds up some of the criticism of the call to boycott Israel by the National Union of Journalists in Britain on her blog. While I thought I was inured to the idiocy of policy statements by journalists' unions on both sides of the Atlantic (I am an American journalist), the action taken by the NUJ is truly astounding. One of their own members is being held hostage in Gaza, by Palestinian militants, as confirmed by members of the Palestinian Authority, and the union's response is to vote to boycott Israel.

As Phillips explains:
"If something nasty happens in the Middle East, they think Israel is the only party to be blamed. If Palestinians kill Jews, blame Israel. If Palestinians kill Palestinians, blame Israel. If Palestinians kidnap a British NUJ member, blame Israel. And if Palestinian journalists protest to Palestinians about the kidnap by Palestinians of a British journalist, those Palestinian journalists are to be 'rewarded' by — a boycott of Israel."
Read her post, the NUJ in La-La Land, at http://www.melaniephillips.com/diary/?p=1499

--Wendy in Washington

1 comment:

Beaman said...

I wrote a criticism myself in poetic form about the NUJ boycott of Israel. As a Briton it angered me greatly. If interested, one can read it at the below address.

http://beamansworld.blogspot.com/2007/04/journalists-hour-of-shame.html