Mass Media Caught Lying About Iraq (Captain Jemil Hussein)

Strategypage.com ^ | 1/5/07

[Valin]

January 5, 2007: The Associated Press has again put out an Iraq story detailing events that did not happen. This time, it involves an airstrike that, " killed a family of four during a firefight." However, according to the press desk of Multi-National Forces-Iraq, no air strike happened during that firefight, and MNF-I also reported that which six insurgents were killed by American troops in Baghdad on January 1. This is the second time in roughly six weeks that the AP has been caught fabricating events.

In November, the AP's report of six people being burned by in an attack on a mosque, cited a Captain Jemil Hussein of the Iraqi police. This report was challenged by Central Command and the Iraqi Ministry of the Interior, who pointed out that they had no record of a Jemil Hussein in their initial searches. The AP has stood by the story, yet this questionable Iraqi police official has not been quoted once since the story was questioned – despite being used in dozens of stories prior to the controversy. After several weeks of investigating, several blogs, including Flopping Aces, found very little evidence that Captain Hussein existed – until the AP reported that an arrest warrant was issued by the Ministry of the Interior for Hussein, whose phone has conveniently been turned off.

This is the latest media scandal involving phony news. In August, Reuters had to pull photographs that had been doctored to create the appearance that Israeli air strikes in Lebanon were doing more damage. Other photos taken during the summer fighting were discovered to have been staged by Hezbollah. In 2005, media reports that guards at Guantanamo Bay had flushed a Koran turned out to have no basis in fact (the actual flushing was done by detainees).

This pattern of misreporting is being noticed by blogs, most notably Flopping Aces (www.floppingaces.net). One of the Iraqi reporters for the AP, Quais Abdul Raazzaq was recently interviewed, and made statements that appeared to be biased. Other blogs have been digging deeper into some of the reporting. And the skepticism about media reporting about Iraq seems to be increasing. In December, the Gallup Poll reported that 56 percent of Americans believe the mainstream media's reporting of the situation in Iraq is inaccurate.

The continued stonewalling by the Associated Press is only going to make matters worse for them. Not only are bloggers sniffing around and posting their findings, but the call for an investigation is growing louder. With the AP now making up an air strike, it seems the case of Jemil Hussein was not isolated, but instead part of a pattern of misreporting and a focus on milestone casualties (the United States recently suffered its 3000th casualty) rather than signs of progress. Reports from the AP regarding Iraq clearly cannot not be trusted. For accurate information, people can turn to the newsrooms of Multi-National Force-Iraq (www.mnf-iraq.com) and Central Command (www.centcom.mil). – Harold C. Hutchison (haroldc.hutchison@gmail.com)

[PGalt]

Great post. Propagandists at work ALERT!

[stylin19a]

there was a story yesterday that Captain Jemil Hussein was found..by AP & the Iraqi government.

Course, the story was put out by AP.

[sure_fine]

all the MSM's, even FNC is about 80% AP reports, shuting them down is about the only way for them to learn not to do that

[johnny7]

IMO, the AP, Reuters and the DBM are bigger threats to the overall stability in Iraq... than the insurgents.

[sure_fine]

not the media, no commie here, just that if they didn't get posted so freely on these news sites, they would have to rethink what they report

[kjo]

It's all about the culture war. The AP and most of the Dem pimp media decided to do whatever necessary to harm Bush. They've done a great job.

Making up stories is nothing new for members of the MSM; and ignoring stories (like Sandy Berger's) is not new either.

These folks lie all the time.

[ishabibble]

After the outrageous lies of the Arab media from Beirut this past summer, why would any rational person believe one single word that AP/Reuters/MSM has to say?

Another disturbing trend that I've noticed from reading the news articles here at FR is that so many now are under the byline of two reporters. Usually these reporters are listed as one Western sounding name and one stone Arab name.
If two heads are better than one, as the old saw goes, then why are two heads necessary to write one news article pocked full of inaccuracies and outright lies? Is it because one Arab Muslim reporter is needed to translate the brazen lies of the eyewitnesses in Fallujah, Haditha, Beirut, etc? Don't bother. I wouldn't believe one of these people if they told me my own name.

[Valin]

(off topic a bit)
Did you see this?
Michael Totten's latest assessment of Lebanon.
The Hugh Hewitt Show ^ | 1/3/07

http://freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1762678/posts
Posted on 01/04/2007 11:20:24 PM CST by Valin


HH: We begin this hour with Michael Totten, I think perhaps America’s most informed writer about Lebanon, just back from Lebanon. Michael Totten, welcome back to the Hugh Hewitt Show.
(snip)

[Red6]

Lies like this are common because our media gets a lot of their news straight from some local Iraqi they hire to do the reporting for them. Much of our so called news in the MSM is literally hearsay.

The errors in reporting reference Iraq should be a major story since it's systemic and has an agenda.

[Cicero]

I think the answer to your question is that it's simply too dangerous for a westerner to go out and report on stories first hand. The terrorists could care less that these reporters are working on their side--they see a westerner, they kidnap or kill him.

So they use local stringers as photographers and newsgathers. And, naturally, the best stringers are the ones who know the terrorists and can work closely with them. By that process, you can be fairly sure that most of the Arab-named photographers and reporters on these AP stories are actually terrorist associates.

How else could a photographer get up close and friendly to a terrorist shooting someone in the head, or firing a rocket at an American Humvee?

So the stringers take the pictures or bring in the raw stories, and the American-named guys take these raw materials and shape them into something smooth and acceptable as propaganda.

[girlangler]

I agree.

BTTT

[april15Bendovr]

Its amazing that the mainstream media (AP) will run uncorroborated stories from this informant but wont give a damn about any info captured and translated from the Docex Project documents that Jveritas had been working on?

[april15Bendovr]

I meant to include send to all in my last post to open this up to everyone on the subject.

[Chances Are]

It's not that they don't give a damn, it's just that it's too much work.

I mean, they've gotten what is obviously a substandard education, they have poor work habits, they're lazy, have very little, if any, understanding of "journalism" in the classic sense, and seem to have lost the ability to find and cultivate leads and sources.

And given this profile, when a "news story" is handed to them by the local riff-raff, you actually expect them to work and go out and corroborate the story?

What's gotten into you?

CA....

[Radix]

Aside from all of the regular lies concerning the so called News for the last 40 years at least, the Media has been lying their collective asses off concerning events in Iraq since March 2003. BIG TIME!

Anything unusual going on in the media lately?

[april15Bendovr]

From our friends at Newsbusters

http://newsbusters.org/node/4542

Ingraham: "Well here, here's what I think David. I think with all the resources of networks like NBC. The Today show spends all this money to send people to the Olympics, which is great, it was great programming. All this money for Where In The World Is Matt Lauer? Bring the Today show to Iraq. Bring the Today show to Tal Afar. Do the show from the 4th ID at Camp Victory and then when you talk to those soldiers on the ground, when you go out with the Iraqi military, when you talk to the villagers, when you see the children, then I want NBC to report on only the IEDs, only the killings, only, only the reprisals. When people are on the ground whether it's recently, David Ignatius of the Washington Post, whether it's recently..."

Gregory: "Okay but, but Laura let's be, hold on, let's be..."

Ingraham: "Let me finish David because you got, you guys are, no, no, let me finish, let me finish..."

Gregory: "Wait a minute Laura! Wait a second! If you want to be fair. First of all the Today show went to Iraq. Matt Lauer was there, he reported there."

Ingraham: "Did he do a show, did you do a show from Iraq?"

Gregory: "Okay and we, and we've got a bureau there so..."

Ingraham: "Yeah. David, David to do a show from Iraq means to talk to the Iraqi military to go out with the Iraqi military, to actually have a conversation with the people instead of reporting from hotel balconies about the latest IEDs going off. It is very difficult in Iraq. People are struggling..."

Gregory: "And you, and you think Iraq is safe enough to, have you been there long enough to venture outside the hotel balconies?!"

Ingraham: "David, yes I did. I wasn't in a hotel balcony I was out with the U.S. military and it can be done in any part of the country. It is dangerous in the Sunni triangle..."

Gregory: "So, so Lau-..."

Ingraham: "...but NBC and networks of the United States..."

[Chances Are]

David Gregory is the quintessential example of "today's journalists", it is true, but that doesn't mean he is a journalist in the classic sense.

I don't think anyone's going to confuse him with Ed Murrow.

CA....

[april15Bendovr]

David Gregory Drunk (or High) on Imus in the Morning

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w-BbjUSAD6w