The Australian Jewish News has failed to put across to the Australian Jewish Community what Senator Santo Santoro said during a session in the Senate where he directly questioned ABC's Editor-in-chief Russell Balding over imbalanced reporting. (See below).

In a report on June 3 2005 titled "Terrorist or Freedom Fighter", the AJN made a half hearted attempt to set the record straight after failing in the previous week to report Santoro's painstaking work in the Senate Estimates Committee for the embattled ABC.

Many readers of the AJN would find the very title "Terrorist or Freedom Fighter" offensive, evoking as it does the famous moral ambiguiser: "One man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter". The ABC trots this one out periodically to those of us in the community who make formal complaints. One wonders whether this is the first axiom taught to ABC cadet journalists.

There is also a rather irritating sentence in the article: "Santoro, described by some Jews as a 'champion for Israel'...". I would arguably call him a champion, but I really don't like being referred to as 'some Jews' in my own ethnic newspaper, by a non-Jewish reporter to boot. "Some readers", "Some members of the community", "Some members of the Jewish community" would have been more appropriate to describe us. Am I being over sensitive?

But the main criticism of the AJN article is that it does not convey the Senator's purpose in focussing on the labels "terrorist", "gunman", "militant". Santoro charged that (a) the ABC policy was not reflective of the realities, and (b) the ABC never adhered to its policy anyway. The policy – recently changed – dictated that journalists avoid the term "terrorist" for fear of offending groups within the community, the only exception being those groups which the UN labels "terrorists".

This resulted in the absurdity that the ABC labeled acts of terror, based not on the facts of the event, but on the perpetrators' identities. 9/11 or Beslan could therefore only be labeled an act of terrorism when its organisers were identified. If Hamas had taken responsibility for Beslan the ABC would have had to refrain from calling it an act of terrorism.

The Senator used the Beslan hostage crisis as a pivotal example. He actually praised the ABC staff for breaking their own rules and using the "T" word constantly in their coverage of Beslan, even though the group was unknown and consequently not on the UN terrorist list.

More than once during the lengthy questioning the Senator contrasted the ABC's reporting in Israel with its reporting in other parts of the world. A few examples:

"I certainly think that every one of your reporters who called them [the Beslan perpetrators] terrorists — Emma Griffith, Tony Jones and Eleanor Hall — did the right thing, and I want to be very clear on the record in relation to that so that nobody could accuse me of going soft on terrorists. Mr Balding, could you describe the difference between killing children in cold blood in a school in southern Russia and killing children in cold blood on a school bus in Jerusalem?"

Contrary to ABC Policy Hizbulla was labelled by the ABC as a terrorist group on one occasion last October after it was alleged that they were specifically targeting Australian troops. Santoro asked:

"Was this policy changed because Australians were being targeted instead of Israeli children?"

And again:

"Four hundred children in Beslan and it is terrorism; 40 in Jerusalem and the killers are freedom fighters! What we are seeing here, I suggest to you, Mr Balding, as well as a breakdown of editorial policy and order in the ABC, is the beginning of a breakdown of the convenient 'not a terrorist offence' that the ABC has always advanced up to now when challenged over partiality to the Palestinian cause when it takes sides in that conflict.

Of course, Balding did not accept the Senator's analysis.

Senator Santo Santoro has a passion for "telling it how it is". From this passion stems his criticism of the ABC and its politically correct stance. The Jewish community, currently under pressure in many corners of the non Jewish world would do well to consider Senator Santoro a good friend.

Terrorist or freedom fighter? ABC quizzed over labels

MICHAEL CAVANAGH

TERRORIST or freedom fighter? Militant or gunman?

The choice of labels used by the ABC prompted Queensland Liberal Senator Santo Santoro, a long-time critic of the national broadcaster, to take to task ABC chief Russell Balding in a Senate estimates hearing last week.

Senator Santoro drew attention to a memo from a former senior ABC official who had said that "Hamas cannot be described as a terrorist organisation".

Balding replied that this had changed two months ago and that "the ABC does not label as a general rule". But he said if groups were labelled, ABC reporters would ascribe who had labelled the group.

Senator Santoro, described by some Jews as a "champion for Israel", also questioned Balding over what he claimed were some journalists deciding to "pick and choose" when it came to using terms such as "terrorists':

Balding disagreed that the "ABC selectively choose to do that" and argued that if a particular individual journalist had done so it was their decision and not ABC policy. While stating that some ABC journalists were "technically some of the best" in the world, Senator Santoro claimed there was "inherent bias" at the national broadcaster - an accusation rejected by Balding.

Balding promised to look into the issues raised by Senator Santoro.