The Committee To Protect Journalists Sells Out To Israel.

The CPJ Sells Out To Israel.

Written By: Justin K.P.

The Committee To Protect Journalists (CPJ), a nonprofit which in the past has done some good work on the Israeli slaughter of journalists in Gaza, is selling out due to pressure from Israel and its lobbyists.

CPJ Changes Criteria For Israel.

Mohammed El-Kurd, the Palestine Correspondent at the Nation Magazine and editor-at-large at Mondoweiss, reports that , “The Board of Directors at the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) will formally change its definition of who qualifies as a journalist, to broadly exclude slain Palestinian and Lebanese journalists who worked for government-funded media outlets.”

He added that, “Israeli, American, and Ukrainian journalists who work for state-funded outlets or are embedded with the military will remain recognized as journalists”.

This move, El-Kurd reported, “was catalyzed to appease the right-wing Zionist rag The Free Beacon, which has repeatedly accused Palestinian and Lebanese journalists of being undercover militants or used their political opinions or affiliations as justification for their killing by the IOF.”

CPJ Falsely Claims Journalists “Participated In Combat”.

This came after the CPJ removed eight Palestinian journalists from its list of reporters killed by Israel, falsely claiming that they “participated in combat”.

This appears to be at the behest of a deception deployed by the Israel lobby, which conflated the fact that these reporters at one point worked in media relations for Palestinian resistance groups to portray them as combatants.

Zionists had run a campaign against the reporters delisted on the CPJ, claiming that groups such as Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ), listed them as members when in reality, the groups listed that they had worked in the group’s media departments, not as combatants.

The Times of Israel admitted that three of the reporters were delisted, not because they took part in armed combat, but because they at one point worked in media relations for the Palestinian resistance.

Journalist Mohammed Nasser Abu Huwaidi, who worked for the independent outlet Al-Istiqlal, once worked in the military media unit of PIJ. Journalist Yaqoub Anan al-Bursh once worked as a military media commentator with Hamas, and journalist Maysara Salah, who worked for the Quds News Network, once worked for the military media for Hamas.

Mohammed Nasser Kamel Abu Huweidi similarly, at one point, worked for PIJ’s Central Military Media Unit, and Mahdi al-Mamluk worked for PIJ’s communications unit.

But the fact that these reporters at one time worked in media for armed resistance groups does not in any way prove that they “participated in combat”, nor does it justify the fact that they were killed by Israel while reporting.

And yet, the CPJ is now giving into this Zionist deception and no longer calling them killed journalists because they at one point worked for the resistance as journalists and media workers.

Whistleblowers Say Zionist Donors Interfere At CPJ.

Whistleblowers from within CPJ had previously exposed to Abubaker Abed at the Electronic Intifada that the NGO’s CEO, Jodie Ginsberg, has been interfering in the organization at the behest of pro-Israel donors.

Ginsberg allegedly “shut down a research piece that was going to prove that Israel deliberately targets journalists. The researcher behind that piece interviewed many former military and drone warfare experts and reached the conclusion that Israel knowingly targets journalists. Jodie found a way to let the piece fall by the wayside. She has one priority: Don’t accuse Israel of an actual war crime,” according to the whistleblower complaint.

They also alleged that “one employee was fired when they argued with Ginsberg because she refused to classify journalist killings as targeted murders, a war crime under international law.”

This was all “result of direct pressure from pro-Israel donors,” according to the whistleblowers.

Whistleblowers from the CPJ similarly told journalist Ali Abunimah that :

Ginsberg ‘decided to cancel [CPJ’s] Impunity Index simply because the math showed Israel is number one.’

Published since 2008, the annual report is designed to highlight countries that allow those who deliberately target journalists to get away with their crimes. The ranking measures the number of unsolved journalist murders as a percentage of each country’s population, covering a rolling 10-year period.

‘It’s a very concrete measure of accountability,’ according to the whistleblowers. ‘The data in it is deeply trusted and cited by the UN Human Rights Office and UNESCO.’

Abunimah reported:

“Since the Impunity Index usually covers a timeframe of 10 years, Israel would have been ranked near the top, if not number one, for many years to come,” the whistleblowers argue.

They allege that Ginsberg “simply couldn’t afford the heat she would get every year from the board, the pro-Israel donors and from Israel itself and its allies.”

---

Note to readers: The Dissident is a reader-supported outlet. If you liked this article, consider becoming a paid subscriber.