Story of the Day: AP Reporter's Tough Gaza Questions Disappeared

During Monday's State Department press briefing, Associated Press State Department Correspondent Matthew Lee posed the most pointed question about the conflict in Gaza and the Bush administration's position: "What’s wrong with an immediate cease-fire that doesn’t have to be sustainable and durable if, during the pause that you get from an immediate cease-fire, something longer-term can be negotiated?" Lee didn't tread lightly either when Deputy Secretary of State Sean McCormack failed to provide a sufficient answer and continued to challenge McCormack on the same point in Tuesday's press briefing.

Yet a funny thing happened on the way to print: the substance of these exchanges never made it into Lee's corresponding articles.

First, here's the main exchange between Lee and McCormack on Monday:

LEE: If it’s true, as you say, and I think that you agree because you do say this humanitarian situation is dire, that lives are at stake, that there have been civilian casualties despite the efforts to minimize them.
MCCORMACK: Right.
LEE: What’s wrong with an immediate cease-fire that doesn’t have to be sustainable and durable if, during the pause that you get from an immediate cease-fire, something longer-term can be negotiated?
MCCORMACK: Well --
LEE: I don’t understand the calculus. If you say you want to save lives and protect people, why not accept something that is less --
MCCORMACK: Right.
LEE: -- than perfect if you can get to that point?
MCCORMACK: Right.
LEE: If you can use that to get to a point that is (inaudible)?
MCCORMACK: I guess the calculation is, Matt, fundamentally that you’re not going to get to that point under those circumstances.
LEE: How do you – how do you figure? How do you --
MCCORMACK: Well, you know, we’ve gone through circumstances like this before, and it – look, it’s – well, there are no sureties in these things. You know, you take a look at the facts, you take a look at history, and you make your best set of calculations and you do what you think is right in order to achieve the objectives that you have laid out. And it doesn’t – it perhaps helps the situation in the immediate term --
LEE: Well, if this is something that can perhaps do that, what’s wrong with that?
MCCORMACK: That’s exactly my point, Matt. Are you trading off against lives in the future that will be lost if you don’t go for a durable, sustainable cease-fire? We’re not willing to do that. Now, this may – of course, we have seen various protests, you know – capitals in the region as well. We’re aware of that. And we’re aware of the fact that lives have been lost, innocent life has been lost. In none of this are there any easy decisions. But you have to take the set of decisions that you believe will ultimately best benefit the people of the region, whether it’s the Palestinians or the Israelis. And people may disagree with our approach, our --
LEE: But isn’t the best benefit keeping people alive?
MCCORMACK: It is, Matt, but I – you know, I --
LEE: If there’s a chance that you can save some lives by going for an immediate cease-fire rather than one that is going to be – you know, that you know is going to be long-term and that meets your conditions, I don’t understand what’s wrong with that.
MCCORMACK: Well, again, Matt, there are people who are advocating that position. I understand that. But ultimately, we don’t think that you address the underlying issues if you don’t try to get a sustainable, durable, non-time-limited cease-fire. And if you don’t get that, you’re going to be right back here again, whether it’s – and you’re going to have somebody else up here three months from now, four months from now, five months from now, talking about the same kind of tragedy. Again, nobody wants to see the sort of humanitarian suffering that you’re seeing in Gaza. We’re not blind to that. We’re trying to address the immediate circumstances, as well as to try to address something that is more durable, so those people in Gaza and the people on the other side of the border can maybe perhaps have some more semblance of a normal life.

Lee also has some other fine moments in this press briefing, including this follow-up to another State Department correspondent's question about what signals the administration gave Israel regarding the military action in Gaza and if it approved of the newer ground incursion. McCormick answers the other correspondent and then Lee jumps in with a dose of reality regarding US foreign policy.

MCCORMACK: Well, this is – you know, this is a question that always comes up. We don’t give green lights, red lights, yellow lights. I think you heard from the Vice President they’re – they didn’t seek our permission or advice, and we didn’t seek to offer any of that. As I – as I said --
LEE: You know, that’s not – that’s just manifestly not true.
MCCORMACK: As I – yes, it is.
LEE: No, no – maybe in – maybe in this, but all over the world you are involved in giving green lights, red lights and yellow lights. I remember when –
MCCORMACK: Am I talking --
LEE: -- when Musharraf --
MCCORMACK: Am I talking about anywhere else in the world, Matt? Am I talking about a specific circumstance? Look --

According to a LexisNexis and Google News search, Lee didn't publish a report after this briefing on Monday.

Lee returns to his original question in Tuesday's press briefing:

LEE: The point is, though, Sean, that if it – if what is proposed has a time limit or you don’t think it’s durable or sustainable, you’re not going to support that; correct?
MCCORMACK: That’s correct.
LEE: That – so while you want one immediately --
MCCORMACK: Right.
LEE: -- you will not accept one that is just a short or a temporary pause?
MCCORMACK: Again, we have deep concern for the humanitarian situation in Gaza and for the innocent lives on both sides --
LEE: Well, if you do --
MCCORMACK: -- both sides of --
LEE: If you do --

[...]

LEE: Sean, can I go back to the question I asked yesterday?
MCCORMACK: Yeah.
LEE: I don’t – I still am not sure I understand your reasoning as to why, if innocent life can be saved --
MCCORMACK: Right.
LEE: -- even one innocent life can be saved by a temporary pause --
MCCORMACK: Right.
LEE: -- ceasefire, what’s wrong with that? Why --
MCCORMACK: There’s – look, I know that that is a point of view that is supported by many. And we value every single life, absolutely. But you also don’t want to get into a situation where you are trading off – you know, trading off saving even one life now, against losing 30, 40, 50 or more in the future and being right back in the same situation.
LEE: But you don’t know that you’re going to --
MCCORMACK: I know, Matt. Look, there’s no cookie-cutter approach to trying to solve these problems, absolutely not. And I would be the first one to acknowledge that these are tough, sometimes gut-wrenching decisions when you see some of the humanitarian suffering on the ground there. I fully acknowledge that. But we have to stand back from that and try to make what we believe are the best decisions possible that will improve the situation in the region for Israelis, Palestinians, and others who have an interest in seeing a different kind of Middle East. And I know there are different points of view on this matter, and I fully respect those points of view. But we are pursuing the course that we believe is in the best interests of the United States, as well as the people in the region.
LEE: But do you understand the impression that that gives or the – that that gives? I mean, that position that you take appears to many people to be a – the proverbial green light for the Israelis to go ahead and do whatever they want until they think that they’re done.
MCCORMACK: Look, you know, I can – all I can do is try to disabuse people of those impressions and those perceptions. Whether or not they listen to what I have to say or the reasoning behind it, I can’t control that. Look, we have seen this – you know, we have been in – the United States has been in similar circumstances -- you can cite many throughout history – of making very, very tough decisions. We had to make similarly tough decisions, for example, back in 2006 when there was a war between Israel and Hezbollah, one provoked by Hezbollah. At the end of that process, as difficult as it was, we believed that the status – you know, the status quo is much preferable and better than the status quo ante. As difficult as that was, and as great as the costs that were incurred in terms of human life and other ways--
LEE: And you’re saying that – so you’re saying that you have the same – that the calculus is the same in this case? That the status quo – what is happening on the ground right now is preferable to what it was before?
MCCORMACK: No, that’s not what I’m saying, Matt. Listen to what I’m saying. What I’m saying – the situation at the end of the conflict between -- you know, between Hezbollah and Israel, and currently, is better and preferable. It’s better for the people of Lebanon. It’s better for the people of Israel. It’s better for the region than the status quo ante.
LEE: So at that --
MCCORMACK: That’s not to say – that’s not to say there weren’t great costs that were incurred in that and that there weren’t difficult decisions that were taken in that regard. But what we can do, and what we have to do as stewards of our national interest as well as doing what we think is best for the interests of the people in the region, is the course that we are currently on.
LEE: So if we take that – this situation, you believe that once Israel is finished with what it’s doing, whatever it’s going to do, the situation in Gaza is going to be better than it was before?
MCCORMACK: You know, again, you’re viewing it through a particular – you know, the particular prism of somehow the United States is offering some sort of counsel about Israeli military operations. We are not.
LEE: No, no, no.
MCCORMACK: Our interest is in bringing about a durable, sustainable ceasefire so that the – what you have after conflict has ended is better than what you had before conflict began. Yeah.

After this Tuesday briefing, Lee wrote up and filed his story. With the misleadingly hopeful headline "Rice Traveling to UN to Push Gaza Cease-Fire" (please note: traditionally speaking, reporters don't write their own headlines), the article opens:

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice will travel to New York and the United Nations on Tuesday in a bid to broker a sustainable cease-fire as soon as possible to end the crisis in Gaza.

Lee knows there's a stark difference between a "ceasefire" and the administration's "sustainable" or "durable" ceasefire. Most of his back and forth with McCormack for two days pivoted on these semantic but very consequential points of distinction. AP editors surely know this as well.

Yet the AP -- America's leading newswire service -- either carelessly or willfully misled its readers and all the news providers it supplied with this headline, many of which, as is often the case, then use it to frame this unfolding story. A headline much closer to the truth would've read "Rice Traveling to UN to Push Conditional Gaza Cease-Fire." Omit "conditional" or some such synonym and the headline gives the false impression that Rice is coming to the Palestinians' rescue. Lee and his editors at the AP realize as well that Rice is coming to the Palestinians' rescue like she came to the Lebanese civilians' rescue in 2006.

The piece continues:

Rice plans to hold several separate meetings with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Arab and European foreign ministers to lobby for a three-tiered U.S. truce proposal and will then attend a U.N. Security Council meeting on Gaza, State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said.

The talks are intended "to further her efforts to bring about a cease-fire that is sustainable and durable concerning Gaza," he told reporters. The U.S. wants to see three key elements in any agreement: an end to rocket attacks on Israel from Gaza and securing border crossings between Gaza and Israel and between Gaza and Egypt.

[...]

McCormack said it was not clear if the council would adopt any resolution on Tuesday and said the United States could only support an immediate cease-fire if it is not time-limited and addresses the three U.S. points.

"We would like to see the violence end today," he said. "But we also want to see it end in a way that is sustainable and durable."

At the White House, press secretary Dana Perino repeated that position.

"We want to get to a durable cease-fire as soon as possible," Perino said. "And if that is immediate, then we would certainly welcome that." [...]

Lee pressed McCormack on this administration position for two days, pinpointing and questioning the transparency of its illogic and brutal disregard to what is now a full-blown humanitarian crisis. But none of Lee's related questions, or McCormack's answers framed by those questions, ever appear in this article. Nor do they appear in Lee's article published the next day, "Rice Extends UN Visit Amid Gaza Truce Debate," which opens:

The Bush administration held off Wednesday from backing an Egyptian-French ceasefire proposal in Gaza, but urged a lasting agreement that would end ongoing violence between Israeli and Hamas forces that have killed more than 670 people.

If you watch or read what Lee said during the corresponding press briefings, it's hard to believe he decided to scrub those exchanges with McCormick. Of course it's possible. But the only thing that's certain is somewhere between Lee's exemplary work in those two prior press briefings and the AP's editorial process, someone decided to censor the pertinent truth about the reckless stupidity and grisly inhumanity of the administration's current Gaza stance.

Comments

[Brad Jacobson]

AP Reporter's Tough Gaza Questions Disappeared

[Christopher Flynn]

So what do you expect from this administration??? It never has told the truth and never will...The ideals of America, truth and justice. are a joke.

[Nick]

It certainly looks like MCCORMACK was trying to stress that he thinks that getting a temp cease fire now, and then a permanent one in a few days would cause more deaths than having no cease-fire now, and a permanent one in a few days, and I just don't believe it.

I highly doubt that getting the quick, temp cease fire would cause more deaths overall (Israeli and Gazan) than not getting one. Sure, it may give Hamas time to regroup and fire one or two rockets more into Israel (if they chose to break the cease fire) that MAY kill a civilian, but it'd save perhaps dozens more Gazan lives by cease firing.

We're asking Israel to maybe, MAYBE, lose one civilian to a broken cease-fire, in exchange for not killing more Gazans, and they are just not willing to do that.

[Batocchio]

Good catch. David Gregory occasionally asked fairly tough questions, but would offer milquetoast reports. In Lee's case, given that this is the AP, I suspect editorial interference is the main problem.

[mapaghimagsik]

That's pretty abysmal, even from the AP.

[pmorlan]

Has anyone asked Lee if the story he filed contained any of this Q & A? In other words do we know for sure who dropped it from the story, Lee or the "editors"? I'd sure like to know.

[Michael]

yesterday I watched as the world media reported on the Israeli bombing of the UN school throughout the day...throughout the day the us headlines changed and the story began to include something like 'residents admitted miltants were in the area by later afternoon.' listening to 1010 wins radio that night the story was read something like 'israel was forced to return fire after miltants fired on troops from a un school. dozens were killed.

Meanwhile in another news story John Ging, Gaza director for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency, said he visited the school, where he was "reassured by my own staff [there] that there were no militants in the schools.

I was appalled by how 1010 wins had presented this story - even the number of killed was changed from over 40 to the more palatable 'dozens' to make israel seems less accountable. seriously, wtf?

[blha]

it's interesting to note that no other reporters present there picked up on teh line of questioning or chose to report on any aspect of the exchange.

also, it is possible that lee included somethin in his report, that his editors nixed.

[Horrible Calculus]

No ceasefire will be approved unless it is brokered by Abbas.

The unspoken endpoint here is forcing Hamas to share power with Fatah in Gaza.

Just wait for (the mostly silent) Tony Blair to 'stand up' to the US and ask us to consider Abbas' peacemaking overtures. The US will then 'twist' Israel's arm and end the incursion.

But in the meantime, Hamas and the Gazan victims must be so thoroughly desperate that they'll welcome assistance from Fatah - and McCormack signals the US will wait until that point - the point when Hamas blinks.

[bob in SLC]

Typical corporate news filtering, somewhere AIPAC is laughing at the US and the world. Frankly if Israel wants to be the Nazis of the 21st century I say let them but don't my US tax dollars or the time of the US congress supporting them.

If the US support of Israel was withdrawn and Israel had to deal with its neighbors on its own, lasting peace or all out war would be almost immediate. In either case the situation would be resolved for the long term.

[AHMAD YAQEEN]

ENDING THIS CONFLICT IS ENTIRELY IN THE HANDS OF THE TERRORIST ORGANIZATION OF HAMAS.THEY CALL THE SHOTS.THEY AGREED TO A LESS THAN HONEST CEASE FIRE IN JUNE,THAT WOULD BE FOR ONLY 6 MONTHS.WHEN THE EXPIRY DATE CAME UP HAMAS DECIDED TO PICK UP THE PACE WITH EVEN MORE ROCKET ATTACKS ON INNOCENT ISRAELIS...WHY IS THE PRESSURE BEING PUT ON ISRAEL WHEN EVEN ISRAEL CANNOT STOP THIS LUNATIC HAMAS FROM ENDING THEIR ROCKETS AND TERROR INSPITE OF PALESTINIAN CASUALITES...HAMAS NEEDS TO BE EXTINGUINSHED..GROW UP!

[AHMAD YAQEEN]

Muslim CANADIAN CONGRESS condemned Hamas for treating the Palestinian people as human-bait in a ploy to provoke Israel into launching an all-out attack on Gaza. In censuring Hamas, the MCC said, the Islamist group had deliberately put the civilian population of Gaza in danger as it played the role of Iran's agent provocateur in the region.

The MCC believes Hamas deliberately rocketed Israel in an attempt to provoke an Israeli response. The fact that Hamas did not fire a single rocket at Egypt, despite that country's blockade of Gaza, clearly demonstrates the attacks on Israel were not to protest the blockade, but to trigger a military response.

Instead of working towards a two-state solution and the creation of a Palestinian State, Hamas has done everything in its power to undermine the authority of President Mahmoud Abbas and sabotage the peace process. No other national liberation movement in modern history has offered martyrdom as a substitute to freedom and statehood. Hamas has set back the clock for the Palestinians and it is time for all Palestinians to recognize that Hamas offers only death, destruction and a place in Paradise, not a Palestinian State

[Paul Krolowitz]

The main gist of McCormicks response was the goal of a "sustainable and durable cease fire", that goal was correctly reported in the peice. Lee's desire for an immediate cease fire regardless if it be "sustainable and durable" is not the administrations goal, and is therefore to be left to an opinion piece.
Everyone should be aware by now that when viewed tactically, the GAZA war is a mistake for the Israeli's, the US, and the Gazan's. However strategically viewed, whereby the coming conflict over Iranian attainment of nuclear strength is considered, this Gazan war is the first battle. In war, the first deaths are considered tragic, before long they are forgotten as the death toll overwelmingly climbs. Unfortunately, the fable that there are "no winners in war", is just that, a fable. There are winners, those that are left to live life.

[honest]

"MCCORMACK: You know, again, you’re viewing it through a particular – you know, the particular prism of somehow the United States is offering some sort of counsel about Israeli military operations. We are not.
LEE: No, no, no.
MCCORMACK: Our interest is in bringing about a durable, sustainable ceasefire so that the – what you have after conflict has ended is better than what you had before conflict began. Yeah."

Lee probably suspects that the "durable, sustainable ceasefire" excuse is to allow Israel to kill as many people as possible in revenge for the few deaths that Hamas has caused.

It sounds exactly like "Dick Cheney" foreign policy. Problem is that it is counter productive and based upon a childish, narrow view of the world and life in general. In this case, it is fed by a variety of factors.

1. The longstanding concern for the lives of Jews that many of us have because of the Holocaust.

This is being squandered to a certain extent. For some people it is gone entirely.

2. The cold war's few hot battles were fought between the Israelis and the Arabs with the U.S. and USSR sponsoring the opposing sides.

The cold war is over though the current administration seems intent on restarting it if they can. President Bush even admitted as much privately. Republicans do better when there is an external threat to cow some of the population into accepting their otherwise unacceptable policies.

3. Money - AIPAC bribes congress and tries to control the news as much as possible. A bribe isn't necessary for many of the Democrats, just the threat of appearing "weak" on foreign policy.

This will likely lead the U.S. to not actually change their foreign policy much under Obama and will probably lead to further terrorist attacks in the U.S. Also, it will lead to failure to reign in spending because the military will still be spending billions in the middle east and U.S. military spending, in general, will not decrease. Under Clinton, we had a chance to reduce the deficit with limited cutting of the military budget. Now, that is not possible. The military needs to get out of the middle east and the Air Force and Navy need considerable reductions in size. Whether wise of not, these have become necessities. While I advocate closing most military bases abroad, I agree that it may not be always wise but it is definitely necessary. I might also add that the U.S. military is probably not the best advocate for the United States in foreign countries. Even wealthy Republicans will agree or they may lose everything as the dollar drops in value and their U.S. holdings become worth less and less.

[Jay]

The only media I see calling the media out on their pro-Israel bias is the Daily Show. The rest of the US media seems to be in-the-pocket of Israel. Why is this? I hope they don't think for one minute that we Americans are so stupid as to buy their line - their refusal to discuss the Gaza situation objectively.

[progress99]

This is how much of the US population is kept on the ideological reservation. AP goes into all the small town newspapers that can't afford their own writers and reporters. Controlling AP output is a huge lever on "mainstream" political consciousness