Talk:Middle East Monitor

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People

New Director: ABDULLAH, Daud Al-Jamal

Resigned: MOHAMMAD, Ibrahim Khalid Ibrahim Darwish

Unacceptable paragraph

Icewhiz wants this:

Some of the staff of the Middle East Monitor as well as the similar Middle East Eye are also active in Interpal, which has been designated as a terror supporting ground in Israel as well as being in on the United States Treasury’s list of specially designated terrorist organisation. The site itself is sympathetic to Hamas, and the Hamas website and social media accounts post and share material from the Middle East Monitor.<ref>[http://jewishnews.timesofisrael.com/font-of-hatred-how-hamas-relies-on-two-uk-websites/ Font of hatred: How Hamas relies on two UK websites], Jewish News, 31 August 2018</ref>

Amongst the problems is that the source mentions one person and not "some". Next, although the State Department does maintain a list of terrorist organizations, "specially designated terrorist organisation" is a category that doesn't exist and is written like that just for puffery. Next, what Hamas republishes is not indicative of a connection and is irrelevant to the article except as smear. But the worst problem is that neither the source nor Icewhiz (who I'll assume doesn't know) identify the author of these claims as a career diplomat with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and a designated spokesperson of the Israeli embassy in London.[1] The fact that Jewish News violated professional journalistic standards by publishing an Israeli government statement as if it was a news article is not an excuse for us to do the same. Zero^talk 01:59, 27 February 2018 (UTC)

It was published as a regular reporting and one should assume it passed regular controls at Jewish News - we could however attribute this as an Israeli response to coverage. The US treasury does have a Specially Designated Global Terrorist list (and I think a few other similar cats) - so I do not see how this is a non existent category. MEMO's pro-Hamas (and pro-brotherhood) editorial line is well established by other sources and is highly relevant for the article (as the editorial line of any publisher is relevant) - I will however collect more sources.Icewhiz (talk) 03:54, 27 February 2018 (UTC)

e.g. - Questions over Sheikh Raed Salah's UK ban - the London-based Middle East Monitor - a pro-Hamas publication ... - the BBC uses pro-Hamas publication without qualifications. It does seem the Telegraph piece, which doesn't seem like an opnion piece, - [2] makes the same claims as Jewish News - Interpal is banned by the US government as a terrorist organisation., Memo’s “senior editor”, Ibrahim Hewitt, is chairman of Interpal, the Hamas and Brotherhood-linked charity.. Hewitt is a major figure here (most senior editor - sole "senior editor" on the staff).Icewhiz (talk) 07:58, 27 February 2018 (UTC)

I stand corrected about "specially designated", though its correct name is the "Specially Designated Nationals And Blocked Persons List" [3]. Interpal is on it, but Middle East Monitor is not. As for Jewish News, your argument is that the article is reliable because the newspaper presented it in a misleading fashion, and I don't need to record my response to that. Zero^talk 10:20, 27 February 2018 (UTC)

Interpal is a charity in the UK and has a Wikipedia page. A remotely neutral description of it would at least have a sentence about its status in the UK and the determination of the Charity commission, as mentioned in the lead of the Interpal article. You can mention the US and Israeli determination if it is relevant, but to leave out the UK status is ridiculous. At least pretend to be writing an encyclopedia article instead of a hatchet job.

As for the editorial line of MEMO, whether or not it supports Hamas or Islamists is irrelevant. The aim of the sentence as phrased is to associated it with terrorism. I quote the lead of the Interpal article: The British High Court found it is libellous in July 2010 to state that Interpal supported Hamas. Kingsindian ♝ ♚ 08:29, 27 February 2018 (UTC)

Ok. Can we mention organizational (and structural - Crown House) ties to other UK MB-linked organizations - e.g. per the Telegraph (which seems to be a better source here) - Other organisations at Crown House are Middle East Monitor (Memo), a news site which promotes a strongly pro-Brotherhood and pro-Hamas view of the region. Memo’s director, Daud Abdullah, is also a leader of the Brotherhood-linked British Muslim Initiative, set up and run by the Brotherhood activist Anas al-Tikriti and two senior figures in Hamas. Memo’s “senior editor”, Ibrahim Hewitt, is chairman of Interpal, the Hamas and Brotherhood-linked charity.[4] - leaving the designation of Interpal itself outside of this article?Icewhiz (talk) 08:43, 27 February 2018 (UTC)

I am not sure what exactly you're asking to include, but I still don't see any mention of the Charity Commission there. Perhaps it is good to disentangle some things. The editorial line of a publication is not the same as supporting some organization materially or supporting terrorism. The Muslim Brotherhood in the UK is not a proscribed organization (after a review in 2015-16 carried out under the then-PM David Cameron, they declined to proscribe it; though they were very critical of it). The armed wing of Hamas is designated as a terrorist organization in the UK, and there is no evidence that any of the organizations mentioned have any involvement with it. Kingsindian ♝ ♚ 09:12, 27 February 2018 (UTC)

I suggest including (paraphrased or not) the Telegraph quote above - just naming the organizations the two leading figures in MEMO are involved in. Obviously what MEMO is doing is legal in the UK. However we should make clear the organizational association and editorial line of MEMO - leaving Memo’s “senior editor”, Ibrahim Hewitt, is chairman of Interpal, the Hamas and Brotherhood-linked charity. - without the US terror designation -or add the designation AND the charity commission report.Icewhiz (talk) 11:42, 27 February 2018 (UTC)

"Interpal, the Hamas and Brotherhood-linked charity." Ugh. Icewhiz, you are threading a very fine line here. Do you want the WMF to have to make payoffs to Interpal? As Kingsindian mention above: Look at the sources in the lead of the Interpal article: Daily Express had to pay 60 K over a similar claim...Huldra (talk) 20:52, 27 February 2018 (UTC)

That assertion in the lede of Interpal actually is not sourced all that well (looks to be a PR release and a link to it in a 2 liner in a Guardian list (which is just listing it based on that report - so it is one PR looking source), from the PR release it seem Express said quite a bit more than just linked - discussing this in the context of an aviation related terror plot) - I do intend to look into that article (and find a more proper source). That being said, the Telegraph seems to have no problem in writing "linked" to Hamas (in general, not armed wing) and MB - factually it is easy to see that some (e.g. the US gvmt) have made a connection - and they are doing that in 2015.Icewhiz (talk) 21:07, 27 February 2018 (UTC)

It is ever so fascinating comparing this article to say Shurat HaDin's Mossad-links (which were routinely removed until ms Darshan-Leitner wrote about it herself in the NYT), or MEMRI (where the sentence "MEMRI's founding staff of seven included three who had formerly served in military intelligence in the Israeli Defense Forces" now has magically disappeared...), Huldra (talk) 20:49, 13 March 2018 (UTC)

Lead: "It has been characterized as a pro-Hamas publication by the BBC."

The Lead is supposed to summarise the body of the article, yet its final sentence, "It has been characterized as a pro-Hamas publication by the BBC," does not reflect anything included lower down. It's probably worth noting that the cited source was written by John Ware, who's output on Israel-Palestine-related material is somewhat controversial. The 2019 Panorama episode, "Is Labour Anti-Semitic?", was one of his.     ←   ZScarpia   12:32, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

Should be included in the body as well. The BBC is a mainstream source.Icewhiz (talk) 14:42, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

The source is John Ware, the publisher is the BBC. If it is included at all (highly dubious, given that the source devotes exactly 3 words to the claim) it should be attributed to John Ware. Zero^talk 14:49, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

Rather than the BBC in the lead, it is probably better to put in Gilligan from the telegraph article, since that is in the body.Selfstudier (talk) 17:43, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

This should be reverted to "by the BBC", as the BBC have strict regulations - a reporter for the BBC would not be allowed publicly state this if it were not within the general consensus of the BBC. Durdyfiv1 (talk) 21:00, 29 September 2020 (UTC)

Extended-confirmed-protected edit request on 9 November 2023

This article lacks balance. It states the Israeli claim that Interpal supports terrorism, and by extension MEMO, an unsubstantiated claim that has been disproven by the UK government (4] Roy Greenslade (13 January 2011). "Catalogue of legal pay-outs that shames Express Newspapers". The Guardian 2600:1700:BD80:13A0:10E:ECA6:E8AF:9867 (talk) 18:37, 9 November 2023 (UTC)

 Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format and provide a reliable source if appropriate. Kautilya3 (talk) 22:46, 9 November 2023 (UTC)

Biased citation on Middle East eye

Cite # 13 is a biased and unreliable source. It should not be used as a credit to the claim that Middle East eye is Hamas-backed 69.119.76.160 (talk) 01:01, 11 November 2023 (UTC)

Found no consensus against and include the telegraph article which was (inconclusively) discussed above

Does someone object? FortunateSons (talk) 19:08, 24 March 2024 (UTC)

Which Telegraph article? -- Kautilya3 (talk) 23:42, 24 March 2024 (UTC)

Footnote 26 FortunateSons (talk) 23:50, 24 March 2024 (UTC)

And the author has something of a track record in regard to the subject matter. Selfstudier (talk) 09:14, 25 March 2024 (UTC)

I read a singular disputed instance of I/P misconduct on Andrew Gilligans Wikipedia page, where the author object to the lack of defence against the claim. Is there more? FortunateSons (talk) 10:48, 25 March 2024 (UTC)

Well, there is https://www.carter-ruck.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/Press_Release-Haras_Ahmed_08.08.17.pdf in addition to the two damages claims mentioned in their article. A quick search suggests there might even be more. Selfstudier (talk) 11:40, 25 March 2024 (UTC)

There is no indication that this particular story has issues and it can therefore stay, but I do think that may be worthy of adding into the article of the journalist if you are willing to take the time. FortunateSons (talk) 11:45, 25 March 2024 (UTC)

As I already said, this author has something of a track record in relevant matters, that should be clear enough, I think. Selfstudier (talk) 11:57, 25 March 2024 (UTC)

I object to the extraordinary BLP claims. Per WP:ECREE and WP:BLP, this at minimum needs multiple reliable sources tethering it together. Iskandar323 (talk) 04:55, 25 March 2024 (UTC)

I don’t currently have the time, so I’m happy to strike the second half until I find some. FortunateSons (talk) 10:43, 25 March 2024 (UTC)

I've removed sources not mentioning MEMO (including an opinion piece in the Spectator, which shouldn't be a source for facts anyway) and attributed to Gilligan instead of leaving in passive voice. Personally, I think Gilligan is a dodgy journalist, but this article seems to be strongly endorsed by the paper as a Sunday Times investigation so unless it's been disputed it might be reliable. No objection to the paragraph going unless there are secondary sources showing noteworthiness. BobFromBrockley (talk) 12:05, 18 April 2024 (UTC)

Looks reasonable, thank you :) FortunateSons (talk) 12:14, 18 April 2024 (UTC)

Undue cite

The following material is undue but disputed as such by @Alexis:: According to Haaretz in 2015, Community Security Trust described MEMO in 2015 as a conspiracy theory-peddling anti-Israel organisation,

CST is a charity with zero capacity to expound on the reliability of a newsorg and the original material comes from a CST blog abount something else entirely which is even worse. Selfstudier (talk) 12:10, 16 April 2024 (UTC)

I think it's unclear what needs to attributed to Ha'aretz and what doesn't. The full quote is: The Community Security Trust, the main Jewish organization monitoring all forms of racism, highlighted on its website that Corbyn is also scheduled to appear soon at a conference of the conspiracy-theory peddling anti-Israel organization Middle East Monitor, along with the anti-Semitic and Holocaust denier cartoonist Carlos Latuff. As the CST's communications director Dave Rich writes, "The problem is not that Corbyn is an anti-Semite or a Holocaust denier – he is neither. The problem is that he seems to gravitate towards people who are." It's not clear if "conspiracy-theory peddling anti-Israel organization" is Ha'aretz's accurate paraphrasing of MEMO or their own editorialising. I strongly believe CST is a reliable source for facts about this organisation. The fact that Ha'aretz, a strong RS, is citing them is evidence that it's noteworthy. Other RSs also cite CST frequently as a reliable source (per WP:USEBYOTHERS), including on the topic of this article. E.g.

• Guardian: Saleh, a Palestinian with Israeli citizenship whose legal team claimed he had not been aware of the ban, came to the UK for a speaking tour at the invitation of London-based Middle East Monitor (Memo), but was detained three days later after May served a deportation notice saying his presence in the UK was "not conducive to the public good"... Just 17 minutes after receiving a report on him, prepared by the Community Security Trust, a UK charity that monitors antisemitism, Faye Johnson, private secretary to the home secretary, emailed about a parliamentary event Salah was due to attend. "Is there anything that we can do to prevent him from attending (eg could we exclude him on the grounds of unacceptable behaviour?)" she wrote. The CST's report said Salah's record of provocative statements carried a risk that his presence in the UK could have "a radicalising impact" on his audiences... The immigration tribunal had been told that the home secretary acted on information provided to the government by the CST and the Jewish Board of Deputies.[5]
• Jewish News: The CST accused MEMO of peddling conspiracy theories and myths about Jews, Zionists, money and power.[6]
• Jewish Telegraphic Agency: On Monday afternoon, i24News, an international news cable news network based in Jaffa, reported that Corbyn visited Israel and the West Bank to meet with Hamas officials in 2010. According to the report, Corbyn, then a minor MP, was flown in by Middle East Monitor, a British organization which has accused Israel of “ethnic cleansing” and whose rhetoric was described as “strikingly familiar [to] older forms of antisemitism” by the Community Security Trust, British Jewry’s anti-Semitism watchdog.[7]
• Jewish Chronicle: Marc Goldberg, Head of Investigations at the Community Security Trust (CST), said the event [attended by Daud Abdullah, director of the news website Middle East Monitor] was part of a growing effort to undermine the interfaith movement, which is supported by many Jewish and Muslim leaders to foster mutual understanding.[8]
• Jewish Chronicle:*During an online event with Middle East Monitor in 2020, Dr Sitta claimed that the founding of Israel was “exactly like Nazi Germany occupying France”... His comments were labelled “racist” by the Community Security Trust (CST), while academic David Hirsh described him as “antisemitic”...[9]

BobFromBrockley (talk) 15:12, 16 April 2024 (UTC)

Dave Rich is another CSTite. The material cited about what he said also is attributed to a 2015 CST blog, and that one is as well about Corbyn, duh! So the two sources alleging conspiracy theories are both CST blogs. Do I need to take this to RSN now or what? Selfstudier (talk) 16:13, 16 April 2024 (UTC)

Their blog is not a self-published source, it's similar to WP:NEWSBLOG and we follow the policy here by attributing the information and not stating it in wikivoice.

As to the CST as a source, it's WP:USEDBYOTHERS ([10], [11], [12])). Alaexis_¿question? 20:05, 16 April 2024 (UTC)

See https://cst.org.uk/news/blog Item 1 "CST Annual Dinner 2024" with a pic of Sunak. It's a blog. And CST is a charity, not a newsorg. Selfstudier (talk) 21:53, 16 April 2024 (UTC)

Look at the menu item "Research", underneath it has Publications, Databases, those are by CST, separately it says "Blog", an opinion section, not a newsblog. Selfstudier (talk) 21:56, 16 April 2024 (UTC)

Most of the blogs are not conisdered RS because they are self-published (WP:V). This is obviously not self published, it comes from an established organisation and has been mentioned by a RS (Haaretz). Alaexis_¿question? 07:57, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

Yes Dave Rich is "a CSTite", as obvious from Ha'aretz, a reliable source, calling him "CST's communications director. That they and other RSs cite him as a CST spokesperson show he/CST was considered noteworthy, which gives us evidence of the due weight of mentioning this.

Re the "blog" issue, to repeat what I've already said on the RSN, this is not a blog in the sense of a self-published source, but a reputable research organisation's regularly updated stream, more like the "news" page of an organisation or comporable to a NEWSBLOG. It is not where they publish their reports, but where they publish press releases about reports or respond to items in the news. It's comparable to SPLC's HateWatch, Media Matters for America's News and Analysis feed, Political Research Associate's Eyes Right column, the "blogs" on the Hope Not Hate website or the LSE blogs

But that's not really relevant here, because we're not citing the "blog"; we're citing Ha'aretz as a secondary source who considered it noteworthy, but could equally/also cite any of the other secondary news sources I gave here who considered it noteworthy and reported the same thing in more or less the same words. BobFromBrockley (talk) 08:46, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

You are not citing Haaretz, you are citing Haaretz citing CST(and the ToI is citing the CST blog of Dave Rich which doesn't even have his name on it), actually the CST blog as Alexis was kind enough to point out. This is still undue, since no-one else is saying this except CST, whether its blog, Dave Rich or whoever, and those Jewish sources you posted are just repeating the same stuff from there as well. So it's a one source deal, a CST blog. Selfstudier (talk) 13:22, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

We don't need to attribute to Ha'aretz and ToI, as these are news articles in reliable sources. We can simply attribute CST. It doesn't matter whether anyone else is saying this; it matters that multiple reliable sources consider CST's perspective noteworthy and it is therefore due. BobFromBrockley (talk) 11:35, 18 April 2024 (UTC)

I have been looking at some other CST blog posts cited on WP, so we have another here https://cst.org.uk/news/blog/2023/10/20/a-letter-to-those-who-celebrate-murder and https://cst.org.uk/news/blog/2023/11/06/your-chants-placards-and-hate-are-shamefully-unoriginal. These are obvious personal opinion type posts and not news at all. Selfstudier (talk) 17:58, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

I don't see how these are relevant to Middle East Monitor. This article doesn't cite the blog; it cites other reliable sources quoting CST's position on MEMO. All that matters is that multiple RSs consider CST's position noteworthy, as clearly demonstrated above. If CST items are being used inappropriately on other pages, you can raise that on their talk pages. BobFromBrockley (talk) 11:38, 18 April 2024 (UTC)

Well, I am definitely going to take up the issue of CSTblog being thought of as a reliable source, that nonsense needs to be nipped in the bud right away. Then we will see. Selfstudier (talk) 12:03, 18 April 2024 (UTC)

I don't know if i24News is an RS, but it also quotes CST on MEMO: MEMO is a UK-based Islamist pressure group, which the UK Jewish community’s antisemitism watchdog accuses of crossing the line into antisemitism. The CST told i24NEWS: “MEMO’s work includes supposed anti-Zionism that is actually strikingly familiar from older forms of antisemitism, but with Jews removed and so-called Zionists used instead.”[13] If reliable, more evidence of noteworthiness, and also (as with some of the other examples) quoting spokespeople rather than the website. BobFromBrockley (talk) 21:03, 18 April 2024 (UTC)

i24 is another crap source. More to the point, are there any majors, cnn, ap, wp, reuters, like that, as opposed to Israeli/Jewish minor sources, reporting any of this? Recent rather than 10+ years ago would be good as well. Selfstudier (talk) 21:19, 18 April 2024 (UTC)

I don’t know i24 so happy to defer on that. (I notice it and MEMO have both used each other as reliable sources at various points.) I don’t think Wikipedia has a rule that Israeli or Jewish sources shouldn’t be used. Wouldn’t that be… racist? Sources don’t have to be mainstream and western to be reliable. BobFromBrockley (talk) 06:13, 19 April 2024 (UTC)

I didn't say that they shouldn't be used, I am pointing out where this info is being repeated, a pattern that recurs quite frequently with contentious accusations, that of said accusations being round-robined in the Jewish/Israeli press with the major sources avoiding it, possibly due to the reality there is really only one source, no matter how many times it is repeated. Selfstudier (talk) 11:26, 19 April 2024 (UTC)

I don't get "there's only one source". There's multiple sources for CST describing MEMO as conspiracy theorists. As for the allegation they're conspiracy theorists, it's not like CST are the only entity to have made that; several have. The fact antisemitism gets more reporting from Jewish RSs than mainstream RSs is hardly surprising; it's not necessarily a sign of major sources "avoiding it" so much as overlooking it. BobFromBrockley (talk) 20:55, 20 April 2024 (UTC)

Examples of other sources alleging MEMO promotes conspiracy theories:

• The Telegraph's Andrew Gilligan saying MEMO has organised several meetings featuring Hamas leaders and terrorist sympathisers; its website also repeatedly peddles conspiracy theories about Jews in articles such as “How money from Israeli donors controls Westminster.”, 2015.
• A professor writing for conservative thinktank Hudson Institute reporting MEMO (described as "Islamist-oriented") as promoting a conspiracy theory about red heifers, 2023.
• The Jerusalem Post saying MEMO was one of a series of Iranian, Turkish and other Middle Eastern outlets ("anti-Israel media in the Middle East") that laundered shady rumours designed to weaken UAE and Israel, 2020.
• Faith Matters, which I believe is a Muslim-led organisation, has an article about Middle East Eye peddling a conspiracy theory, which mentions the MEE journalist, David Hearst, writing an apologia for antisemitism in MEMO, 2019.
• The Milli Chronicle saying that MEMO has spread an Iranian-sourced fake story about Saudi Arabia(An article shared almost 7,000 times on Middle East Monitor claims that Saudi Arabia has authorised an incorrect translation of the Quran and implies that it this was done to please Israel. The news was shared far and wide by anti-Saudi blogs and social media pages. The news however, is fake. The article claimed that the Masjid Al Aqsa was changed to “The Temple” which is the Jewish name for the third holiest site of Islam. The claims got even wilder where it was claimed that Saudi authorities allowed the name of, the Messenger of Allah, Muhammad (‎ﷺ) to be deleted from the Quran. The source of this claim is the biggest concern. Middle East Monitor claims their source as “Shehab News Agency”, an extremist blog which was removed from Facebook in 2015 for promoting extremism and anti-Semitic content. More specifically the source is “researcher on Israeli affairs, Aladdin Ahmed” which upon closer inspection leads us to the original article from which the Middle East Monitor article seems to be taken. The Iranian website Iqna.ir which published the same story 28 hours before Middle East Monitor. They place their sources as the same video and the same individuals.) 2020.
• Moment accuse MEMO of helping to spread a fake story about Israel and George Floyd(There were many others who claimed direct Israeli responsibility for deadly force used against African Americans. The Middle East Monitor (MEMO), a press monitoring organization that has been characterized as a group that promotes Jewish conspiracies and is pro-Hamas, circulated a cartoon of an Israeli soldier instructing an American policeman in a classroom on how to kneel on someone’s neck.) 2020.

Examples of other sources alleging MEMO is pro-Hamas:

• The BBC calling it "the London-based Middle East Monitor - a pro-Hamas publication", 2018.
• Ha'aretz calls it pro-Hamas, 2021.

BobFromBrockley (talk) 21:49, 20 April 2024 (UTC)

There is a current discussion at RSN, take it there? Selfstudier (talk) 22:09, 20 April 2024 (UTC)