Netanyahu’s boycott – of the Israeli media

By +972 Magazine February 9, 2014 | Edit

By Tal Schneider

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has not given a single interview to the Israeli press since January 19, 2013. Not one question answered at a press conference, not a single one-on-one, and forget about a roundtable.

In a democracy, this is incomprehensible.

Amit Segal’s Channel 2 story on the matter (‘A year since the elections – the prime minister refuses to be interviews’, [Heb]) says it all. Nothing happened even after that.

Netanyahu grants numerous interviews in many languages to the foreign press — but not in Hebrew to Israeli reporters.

As a political blogger, I don’t even dream that I’d get a sit-down with Netanyahu but I would certainly try to ask the prime minister questions at press conferences — if only he would hold them.

So, I’m launching the Plog’s “Netanyahu Stop-Watch.”

I would like to call the attention of foreign press to the fact that in the “only democracy in the Middle East,” as Netanyahu described Israel again recently, the prime minister holds no press conferences and grants no interviews to the local media.

Perhaps my foreign colleagues, then, will ask him what he’s afraid of?

Tal Schneider is a political reporter. A version of this post first appeared on Tal’s blog, the Plog, and republished here with the her permission.

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TEST TEST GAL Our team has been devastated by the horrific events of this latest war. The world is reeling from Israel’s unprecedented onslaught on Gaza, inflicting mass devastation and death upon besieged Palestinians, as well as the atrocious attack and kidnappings by Hamas in Israel on October 7. Our hearts are with all the people and communities facing this violence. We are in an extraordinarily dangerous era in Israel-Palestine. The bloodshed has reached extreme levels of brutality and threatens to engulf the entire region. Emboldened settlers in the West Bank, backed by the army, are seizing the opportunity to intensify their attacks on Palestinians. The most far-right government in Israel’s history is ramping up its policing of dissent, using the cover of war to silence Palestinian citizens and left-wing Jews who object to its policies. This escalation has a very clear context, one that +972 has spent the past 14 years covering: Israeli society’s growing racism and militarism, entrenched occupation and apartheid, and a normalized siege on Gaza. We are well positioned to cover this perilous moment – but we need your help to do it. This terrible period will challenge the humanity of all of those working for a better future in this land. Palestinians and Israelis are already organizing and strategizing to put up the fight of their lives. Can we count on your support? +972 Magazine is a leading media voice of this movement, a desperately needed platform where Palestinian and Israeli journalists, activists, and thinkers can report on and analyze what is happening, guided by humanism, equality, and justice. Join us.

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