NEWSPAPERS are learning that fake news is bad for business.
The latest to find that out is the Jewish Chronicle aka the JC, the United Kingdom's oldest Jewish newspaper, when several prominent columnists, one of them, Jonathan Freedland, who also writes for The Guardian, quit on Sunday in protest, saying that the weekly had printed a series of articles by contributor Elon Perry on the Gaza conflict allegedly based on "wild speculation".
One such fabricated piece of writing was about the discovery of a Hamas "document" that supposedly revealed the armed group's plan to use the Philadelphi Corridor, the Gaza-Egypt crossing, to smuggle Israeli hostages into Iran.
Interestingly, a few Israeli newspapers turned the JC's scandal into breaking news, quoting Israeli Defence Forces' sources as denying the existence of such a document.
It turns out, Perry was a former IDF officer. Was he helping Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu shape public opinion against the Palestinians? Or against Iran? Or to push the United States into a war with Iran? Or to keep the conflict in Gaza going?
All very likely given Perry's regurgitation of Netanyahu's points raised at a press conference held in Jerusalem on Sept 4 On that day, Netanyahu was all about keeping the corridor under Israel's control, a point that Hamas is understandably unwilling to concede.
He knows his last-minute insistence on its control will keep the conflict going, a goal that is to his benefit. End of conflict means the end of Netanyahu. This is dangerous journalism. And a bad one, too. Sadly, many mainstream newspapers in the West — big names even — engage in such crass craft, either being bought by ideology or money.
Little wonder, such newspapers choose to become warmongers. Had they spoken truth to power, which is what good journalism is all about, at the very least, war criminals would have been held accountable. Or could have ended wars, like they did in Vietnam.
Freedland's disgust must have been so unbearable that he not only wrote to the editor of the JC, but posted the letter on X, which has since been picked up by the media. He began thus: "I have today (Sept 15) told the editor of the JC that I can no longer continue my relationship with the paper."
What followed, after some niceties, was a flood of odium: "The latest scandal brings great disgrace to the paper — publishing fabricated stories and showing only the thinnest form of contrition — but it is only the latest.
Too often, the JC reads like a partisan, ideological instrument, its judgments political rather than journalistic." Freedland is right. Just look at the articles published online by the JC.
It's hard to miss the odour of its ideology. After mounting pressure from its journalists and others outside, the newspaper removed the articles on Saturday. Unfortunately for the JC, all the damage had been done by the disgrace visited on the newspaper.
Do editors get easily fooled by fake journalists? Unlikely, especially when strict journalistic standards are in place. The JC scandal is more of a surrender, and less of a miss. There is a lesson here for all: fabricated journalism comes at a huge cost to humanity.