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As we recently reported, New York Magazine did a cover story on “The Return of Ta-Nehisi Coates.” Coates had traveled to the Israel/Palestine region on a ten-day trip in the summer of 2023 and was told the situation there was complicated. “For Coates, the parallels with the Jim Crow South were obvious and immediate,” New York reported.

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CBS News interviewed Coates and said the interview did not meet editorial standards.

The Free Press reports:

Last week, CBS journalist Tony Dokoupil conducted an interview with the writer Ta-Nehisi Coates whose new book, The Message, includes a one-sided polemic against Israel. Coates himself describes his book as an effort to debunk the complexities journalists invoke to obscure Israel’s occupation. He complained in an interview with New York magazine that the argument that the conflict was “complicated” was “horseshit,” that was how defenders of slavery and segregation described these plagues a century ago. “It’s complicated,” he said, “when you want to take something from somebody.”

So Dokoupil asked him about it.

“Why leave out that Israel is surrounded by countries that want to eliminate it?” 

“Why leave out that Israel deals with terror groups that want to eliminate it?” 

“Why not detail anything of the first and second intifada. . . the cafe bombings, the bus bombings, the little kids blown to bits?”

In other words, Tony Dokoupil did his job. 

That’s when his troubles began.

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… but angered some at CBS who felt Dokoupil brought his own bias (1/5)

… Jan Crawford criticized the leaders for their decision, saying the following… (2/5)

… it’s my understanding that as a journalist we are obligated to challenge that worldview, so that our viewers can have access to the truth and can have a more balanced account…” (3/5)

… about a deeply complex situation that completely was devoid of history or fact. As journalists, that’s what we have an obligation to do.” (4/5)

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Apparently, CBS News is going to have a safe-space meeting tomorrow so that CBS employees can process their emotions.

“Trauma trainer.”

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This reminds us of when the whole New York Times newsroom said they felt “unsafe” after the paper published an op-ed by Tom Cotton calling for the National Guard to be called in to quell the riots in the summer of 2020. 

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