Rage Against `The Page'
Free Press Mideast primer accused of downplaying the role of Arab terrorism.
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DAVID SACHS
Senior Copy Editor
A
one-page Detroit Free Press "primer"
offering a historical overview of the
Mideast conflict has raised a grassroots
protest by nearly a thousand members of
the Detroit Jewish community.
The primer, entitled "A region in crisis" and pub-
lished on page 10A of the March 13 Free Press,
offered issues, maps, a timeline the key players in
the Israeli-Palestinian confrontation.
After the wave of suicide bombings aimed at the
Israeli public intensified in March, some local Jews
began getting frustrated watching TV news where
Arab groups (labeled as terrorists by the U.S. State
Department) are referred to as mere "militants."
And when their morning newspaper's primer on
the Mideast crisis didn't mention Palestinian leader
Yasser Arafat's lifetime of terrorism and failed to
identify Palestinian terrorist groups as such, they got
angry.
Berl Falbaum, a Farmington Hills-based public
relations executive, tapped into some of that anger
with a petition drive to get the Free .Press to correct
what Falbaum calls a grossly inaccurate historical
record.
Falbaum was a reporter for the Detroit News in the
1960s and has taught journalism part-time at
Wayne State University for 34 years. He's an occa-
sional opinion page contributor to the Free Press,
Detroit News, Oakland Press, Detroit Jewish News
and Michigan Chronicle.
"I got a barrage of phone calls at work and at
home saying, 'What are your going to do about
this?"' Falbaum said. "It all ended up in a meeting
at my house on a Sunday [March 24], with about
15 people."
The group decided to. run a one-page", petition-
style ad in the Free Press to respond to the one-page
primer. But when they found the cost prohibitive,
they decided to run the ad in the Jewish News
instead [see pages 30-31], then send it to Free Press
Publisher Heath Meriwether, asking him to print it.
Falbaum's committee obtained 960 signatures for
the ad and the endorsement of four organizations:
the Anti-Defamation League Michigan Region,
B'nai B'rith Great Lakes Region, Jewish War
Veterans-Department of Michigan and Jewish
Women International Morgenthau Chapter.
"The signatures tell you the outrage in the com-
munity," Falbaum said.
Contributions received by the committee exceed-
ed the cost of the Jewish News ad by $2,000. Those
funds will be donated to the Friends of the Israel
Defense Forces.
The disputed elements of the Free Press primer
can be found on its Web site by clicking on the
headlines, "Key players in the Mideast dispute,"
"The Leaders: Yasser Arafat and Ariel Sharon" and
"The Tension Today: Two peoples, one strip of
land, no easy answers" on the Web page
httpildetroitfreepress.com/backindex/2002/03/13/
newsindex.htm
Falbaum's ad lists six major objections to the Free
Press package, including these issues:
• The failure to report Arab nations were respon-
sible for wars to "drive Israel into the sea."
• The failure to refer to Arafat's "40 years of terror."
• The failure to state that Arafat, in Arabic, "con-
tinually called for Israel's destruction."
• The implication that the second intifada (upris-
ing) was launched because of then-Israeli opposition
leader Ariel Sharon's visit to the Temple Mount.
• The failure to distinguish between Israeli civilians
killed intentionally by Palestinian terrorists and
unfortunate fatalities of Arab civilians caused by
Israel when terrorists have taken refuge among them.
• The claim that Palestinians were driven from
their homes when Israel was founded.
The point of his ad, Falbaum said, is that the
primer was "a page depicted as history, which means
it's supposed to be all factual.
"There's no question you'll come away from read-
ing [the primer] with the impression that Israel has
been culpable for 50 years of violence.
"They talk about that the Arabs consider Sharon a
.
war criminal. There's no balance to
show that Arafat, at least in Jews'
eyes, is considered to be a terrorist."
Free Press Responds
Falbaum sent a draft of the ad to
Free Press' Meriwether April 7.
Berl
Meriwether responded with an offer
Falbaum
to run a streamlined version as a let-
ter to the editor.
Falbaum said he would have to
consult with his committee on
whether to accept the offer. His per-
sonal reaction April 10 was that he
was looking for the paper to print a
correction — not a letter to the edi-
to r.
Meriwether, in explaining the Free
Press'view, said the primer had a
Heath
limited scope.
Meriwether
"The primer tried to provide our
readers basic information and histo-
ry about the Mideast conflict in a
one-page format," he said. "It wasn't
intended to be a full treatment of
that history, with all perspectives
and interpretations of all the parties
included."
Meriwether acknowledged the
subject matter involved tremendous
David
sensitivity.
Gad-Harf
"We sit here with perhaps the
largest Arab-American population
in the country — with certainly a
vigorous, strong and large Jewish
population. And I understand that
everybody is looking at everything
we do very carefully, and it's a time
of tremendously high emotion. And
we try as best we can to give people
Don
the information in a fair and accu-
rate way. ,,
Cohen
Falbaum said he was concerned
that schoolteachers might use the
primer as a teaching aid, but Meriwether said the page
was not reprinted by the paper as a reference guide.
.
Clarifications
In addition to the Falbaum group's efforts, the
Jewish Community Council of Metropolitan Detroit
pursued the issue.
David Gad-Harf, Council's executive director, led
a delegation that met with Meriwether and Free Press
editors March 20.
Gad-Harf's biggest complaint was with the con-
RAGE
on page 26
4/12
2002
25