Fisk and his view of Israeli-Palestinian issues

Re “Telling it like it isn’t,� Opinion, Dec. 27

Robert Fisk’s shtick hasn’t changed since his 2002 soliloquy at Beyond Baroque in Venice: America is wrong; Israel is wrong; everyone else is right. For Fisk, no Palestinian’s actions are worthy of opprobrium, and no Israeli does the right thing.

Instead of advocating for the tens of millions who have suffered under corrupt regimes in the Islamic world, Fisk attacks democracies and democratic institutions, including a free press’ choice of language.

If one doesn’t like the Boston Globe, there are alternatives in print and certainly online. How many copies of the Jerusalem Post are sold in Riyadh? How sad that his boundaries are so rigidly fixed, and how sad some will give his clear biases credence

MARK A. KELLNER

Rockville, Md.

*

Those of us who know anything about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict have long been aware of Fisk’s point that language used to describe the conflict in the U.S. media is slanted in favor of Israel.

We have often written to the media complaining of this very thing, yet they continue to call Palestinian land taken over by Israeli Jews “disputed� despite the fact that international law finds that it is “occupied.� They continue to call a huge concrete wall a “fence,� and political assassinations are “targeted killings.�

I suppose it was to be expected that we would be ignored when even journalists -- the editors and reporters -- are willing to sacrifice their professional ethics (and dignity) by practicing self-censorship.

MIRIAM M. REIK

New York