The lobby of the Bloomberg Tower in the heart of Manhattan is clear and bright. But it’s not only the glass walls that let New York in. Candy and beverage carts are strewn in a large space surrounded by well-dressed journalists sparring, gossiping, and debating. The economic data center the media giant operates on a subscription basis maintains its status as a financially stable body at a time when other media groups are trying to stop the bleeding.
“You see that man?” asks Ethan Bronner the managing editor of international news at "Bloomberg" of a man standing next to one candy cart. “He voices the announcements on the New York subway system.” Without a doubt, Bronner knows how to impress Israeli journalists.
It’s been nearly four years since Bronner returned from Israel. Between 2008 and 2012, he served as the Jerusalem bureau chief for the "New York Times." He is a Jew with extensive family in Israel, who is also married to an Israeli woman. As a foreign news editor for the "New York Times", he was familiar with how intensely tensions can enflame in the Middle East as well as the media institution for which he wrote.
But he will willingly admit that no one could have prepared him for the backlash he endured when his son, Eli, decided to enlist into the IDF in 2010. “He didn’t want to go to college,” says Bronner, speaking for the first time in detail of the affair that drew extensive media attention both in the US and Israel. “He went to ulpan and announced he wanted to join the military. I knew it could be problematic for me, but I felt that he was his own person and had the right to make the decision. I also hoped it wouldn’t become public knowledge so quickly - it doesn’t have to be that way, they don’t announce who gets drafted on what day or why. I informed my editor in New York, she knows my son, she knew he is a complicated kid, and she said she hoped it would help him.
“Within a month, two Palestinian websites sent me messages: ‘We understand your son is in the military, can you confirm.’”
Bronner forwarded the request for comment to his editors; they said his son was in charge of his own fate and the newsroom had full faith in Ethan. The story was published in 2010 and, despite the backing of the editors, the ombudsman a significant role at the "New York Times" called for his reassignment. “He has committed no wrongdoing,” explained the ombudsman at the time, “But it would be appropriate to find him another assignment.”
The newspaper refused and Bronner completed his posting as planned in 2012, a year after his son finished his service and returned to the US.
Looking back, would you say it affected your work as a journalist?
“I can’t answer that. I don’t believe so. It’s very personal, but what I will say is that I have an Israeli wife and hundreds of relatives in Israel. I have seen Israelis in uniform my whole life. One of my cousins was one of the first conscientious objectors in Israel back in 1966 and I have other relatives who were settlers in Gaza. I have relatives who were objectors and relatives who served in combat roles. The way I see it, my son joining the military did not influence me in the slightest. It did not sway me one way or the other.”
It is interesting that his choice presented you with a dilemma, while for Israeli journalists it goes without saying.
“True, but as a foreign reporter you are in a more complicated spot.”
“The notion of Jewish democracy is problematic”
“When I arrived in Israel in 2008, the outlook of the Israeli government was ‘be nice to the Times,’” says Bronner. He has a hearty laugh and a broad smile, until he is challenged over his journalistic optimism. Then his eyes narrow from behind his glasses, teeming with uncompromising determination. Unlike other New York Times alumni especially the pro-Israel crowd Bronner remains protective even today at Bloomberg of the position of the leading news organization in the world, in which the news reports are so dry as to appear biased to the mainstream Israeli. After all, everyone knows journalistic balance is a fiction that no media group actually tries to maintain.
“When Netanyahu came to power, relations continued to be good. There was some anger over the opinions section, but there was always respect for the news. I did not feel any hostility, and there was no ill will from my point of view,” he says.
“Maybe there was some hostility when you went to a settlement. But Israel is a pleasant place to work - because people are very chatty and they want to talk to you. Nowadays in Israel there is a sense of isolation and mistreatment at the hands of the foreign press, so you see anger towards foreign reporters. MK Tzipi Livni convened a Knesset hearing to ask, ‘Why do they hate us?’ And yet, I still don’t feel the situation is out of control.”
Do you agree with sentiment in Israel that the country has an image problem in American media?
“Israel has a great reputation in the US. The question is who is trying to promote the opposing view. We must acknowledge that Americans are pro-Israel and that there are those trying to spread the idea that Israelis are always the victims and ‘everyone is always against us.’ True, ignorance is widespread; just as many dentists are terrible, so are many journalists. But most of the foreign journalists in Israel are pretty Israeli. You can’t say they do not know the place.”
There is the claim that Israel hosts too many foreign reporters leading them to search for negative leads.
“The number of foreign journalists is substantially small. Over the years, there were statements that there were too many foreign reporters contributing to disproportionate coverage, which leads to a negative outlook of Israel because the media is always looking for negativity and fails to highlight positives. On the other hand, anyone asking about the image of Israel must face that every survey conducted in the US on Israel in the past 50 years had the same results pro-Israeli. Christian Zionism, which has a long history in the US, predates European Jewish Zionism. There is a deep Christian faith in Israel and identification with Jewry.
“Europe carries guilt over the Holocaust, and the Arab-Muslim population in those states has its roles. Beyond that, the dismantling of colonialism is a major effort carried out by the European elite for the past few decades, and the Israeli occupation looks like a relic of that enterprise. It plays a role in European conduct towards Israel.”
What is the source of Israel’s image issues its policies or how it presents its case for them to the world?
“We must differentiate between criticism of what Israel represents and what it does. In the US, the criticism where it exists is mainly over what it does, its policies. On the other hand, there is criticism in the Muslim world and European liberals over the identity of Israel. The notion of an ethnic nation with a religious component appears anti-modern.
“The notion of Jewish democracy is problematic, but that can be solved. However, the occupation makes a solution harder to achieve. In recent years, it seems more apparent that Israeli has no intention of ending the occupation, which is why the dangerous question over the basis of Israel’s existence and what it represents has bubbled to the surface. The idea that Israel will cease to exist appears idiotic, but people are talking about it. Israeli policies are starting to knock on the door of its existential legitimacy.
“Overall, the coverage in America does not revolve around the legitimacy of the State of Israel, unlike Europe, where that discussion is held openly. But when you are dealing with BDS, and as that movement expands, you are forced to respond to that issue.”
And that’s their success.
“Exactly. The Israeli right wants to have the debate over the legitimacy of Israel’s right to exist because then they can say, ‘See? It doesn’t matter what we do. It’s about who we are.’ It allows them to keep their agenda.”
Meaning, if I understand you correctly, the rightwing Israeli government wants to leverage the claim the world is against us.
“It is preposterous that Danny Dayan will come here as consul general, when his entire political career is based on the settlement enterprise. When you turn the settlements into your political torch, you are saying that settlement building is Zionism. And it’s not only Dayan, it’s also Danny Danon being appointed as the UN ambassador, given what he represents. I would love to ask Netanyahu what he was thinking. What is he trying to do, to equate settlements with Zionism? To send settler leaders abroad to show them as the public face of Israel? What for?”
Maybe the prime minister chose Danny Dayan because he was the right man for the job?
“Then how do you explain Danon? He is wildly extreme in his rhetoric on everything settlements. He does not represent the Israeli consensus. If settlements are the essence of Zionism for the Israeli government, and the world believes settlements must be changed, then the question of Zionism automatically falls under that category as well for Europeans. Israel does not want a Palestinian state; it wants to deal with the Palestinians as a security issue.”
Hamas is not a terror group
Did the agenda you are setting out now spill into your reports when you were in Israel? When you were reporting from Israel did you try to change the reality on the ground?
“I am not trying to change the world, merely cover it and report it accurately. Painting the complex portrait is an important part of that. Of course I have my own views, but I do not express them.”
How do you manage to avoid that predicament?
“I try to constantly question myself. I take nothing for granted. I want the reader to understand the world is complicated not that I am right.”
During the intifada that has beset Israel in the past few months, several reports from global media outlets appeared one-sided on the issue some were outright lies. One notable instance was a CBS report of a Palestinian that was shot which failed to note he was holding a knife and had committed a terror attack.
“Not everyone is great at what they do, but I believe there is a lot of professionalism and a vested interest in getting it right. In many such cases, when there is a stabbing, there is much confusion at first as to the cause, but you have to publish it quickly in the digital age; though, I am not backing CBS. I remember in 2011 when I was covering a difficult event in which a settler family was murdered…”
The Fogel family from Itamar.
“Right. When it happened, the first thing we filed did not report a massacre. It was what we were all thinking, but when we were first writing the story we couldn’t say terrorists were responsible because it could have been an unstable uncle or a disgruntled employee, and there was a backlash that we didn’t immediately call it ‘terror.’ In the first hours you need to be cautious, and those are the hours in which people are most sensitive and their anger is channeled to the wrong place. You must be careful with every assumption.”
And after you had a more complete understanding of the Fogel family massacre, did you use the word terror?
“My approach was to not overuse the term. It’s a charged term, but no one wants to be a terrorist. They are freedom fighters or assassins in their own eyes, and I felt it was possible to describe something without using the word terror. It is enough to say that a man came and murdered a four-year-old child in their sleep that is strong enough. Beyond that scenario, when you attack an occupying soldier, you are not a terrorist and it doesn’t matter to me who you are. It might not be nice and maybe people won’t like it.”
What about Hamas or Hezbollah do you consider them terrorist organizations?
“I have never used that term for these groups. They commit acts of terror, but to always mark them as a terror group diminishes everything they do down to those acts alone. Hamas and Hezbollah have political arms, they run schools, welfare services, and they deal in a wide variety of areas. I would not use ‘terror organization’ to describe them.”
So if a someone has a family, owns a home, and has a steady job, and then they go and murder a person, you would not describe them as a murderer because it takes away from what they do?
“Look, the way I see it, the most significant part of Hamas and Hezbollah is not their terror operations. I prefer to describe every act for what it is. The same goes for Fatah. Terror is exclusively a negative term. We must be careful using it.”
And the ISIS executioner also not a terrorist?
“The Palestinian movement to liberate Palestine is motivated by an identifiable goal. ISIS and Al-Qaeda do not. You can understand the Palestinian idea and their wish for a state.”
“Israel does not have a PR problem”
“The image battle waged by Israel is important, you need to try to control the narrative,” says Bronner. “I have been reporting on Israel for 35 years, and consistently from the very outset Israelis have felt they have a public image problem, but I never felt it. I always believed Israel’s PR was of the highest level, while the Arabs were merely keeping up. I don’t believe Israel has a PR problem.”
He claims he is not politically active, though he participated in a session at a conference of liberal Jewish-American group J Street, which is a vociferous critic of Israel. “The fact is that Jewish Americans in the US are generally liberal, while Israel demands its supporters not be as liberal. It’s a problem. It’s hard for Jewish Democrats to feel as they had in the past, when Israel was a relatively poor country; today it is relatively rich and it is hard to sympathize with it. It’s difficult for Jews in this country to accept that Israel is not doing enough to change the status quo in the West Bank. As long as it seems like the first world versus the third world, the white man versus the dark man symbols deeply embedded in the American national memory the lack of sympathy will only intensify.”
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes-online.com - on April 18, 2016
© Copyright of Globes Publisher Itonut (1983) Ltd. 2016