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An Ominous Warning: Campus Journalism Fueling the Next Generation of Anti-Israel Media

People pass a cluster of signs outside a pro-Hamas encampment at Northwestern University in Evanston, Ill. on April 28, 2024. Photo: Max Herman via Reuters Connect

I can still remember the excitement, nervousness, and curiosity in covering my first story as a Daily (Northwestern University’s longstanding campus newspaper) reporter and Medill School of Journalism student in the early 2000s.

Notebook and pens in hand, I recounted what had been drilled in my head: make sure to talk to all sides, get balanced quotes from both parties, and it was my job to report as an objective observer. I was supposed to report the facts.

This lesson was incredibly important when, later in my college career, I was tasked with covering student reactions to a white supremacist who spoke on public property in front of a Northwestern building.

Despite this highly controversial event, The Daily reported the facts objectively, and ultimately, the speech became a learning moment for the university around race. Fast forward 20 plus years, and I wish I could say the same standards of objectivity and balanced reporting existed within The Daily, as well as in the majority of mainstream media, about the anti-Israel protests riling campuses across the nation.

Media bias is not a new phenomenon, especially on topics such as politics and Israel. Yet the current climate in the aftermath of the October 7 atrocities feels intensified, as Israel and Jews face a massive and unfathomable PR war. It’s hard not to open a newspaper or turn on the TV or pull up the latest social media post without a story that only tells one side.

It seems that journalists have lost their way, allowing their stories and publications to become platforms for hate and fueling terrorists’ agendas. This hate extends beyond Jews — but is also anti-American and anti-democratic with messages of “death to America” and “the West is next” — yet these frightening sentiments are rarely reported.

Especially in a world of increased misinformation and hatred, journalists have an increased obligation to draw on foundational elements of their “craft” — leading with objectivity, investigating, scrutinizing, questioning, sourcing, listening, learning, and ultimately speaking truth to power to separate fact from fiction.

Through the lens of a former Daily editor and Medill alum, I recently wrote a Letter to the Editor (LTE) to The Daily titled “Stop Biased Reporting and Providing a Platform for Terrorism,” calling out bias specific to The Daily’s hourly coverage of the now somewhat disbanded anti-Israel encampments in the center of Northwestern’s campus.

After an immediate response requesting I turn my letter into an op-ed, followed by two days of collaborative editing and meeting deadlines, I received a note in the final hour declining publication because “the assertions in the LTE are factually incorrect and misrepresent the Daily’s work,” and with no response to my offer to discuss — ultimately further demonstrating The Daily’s bias and one-sidedness.

Since October 2023, The Daily has declined several LTEs with a pro-Israel perspective.

When The Daily’s reporting and content reads as if reported from a protester and not a reporter, when in four days of hourly coverage there was only one story representing the perspective of Jewish students, it violates a sense of safety and belonging for Jewish students/faculty on campus, further fueling the pro-Hamas propaganda.

In some ways I don’t fault The Daily — I fault Northwestern for employing professors like Steven Thrasher who has repeatedly reiterated the message to Medill students that “our work is not about objectivity.” Thrasher most recently stated this during the encampment as a faculty organizer. The hypocrisy and irony that this is the message coming from one of the top journalism schools in the world is pretty high. It degrades the integrity of journalism and fuels the pervasive bias we see today, and will unfortunately likely see from the next generation of journalists if this continues.

Parents of current Medill students and Medill alumni have repeatedly expressed concerns to Medill and The Daily, asking what discussions, guidance, and education student journalists are provided with on these complex topics of navigating bias, separating personal beliefs from reporting, and sourcing information with facts, with little more than lip service as a response. And whether The Daily is student-led or not, it’s a direct reflection of the school and its training. Northwestern students and alumni are even potentially exploring alternative campus news publications given the one-sided path The Daily has chosen.

If the media choose not to scrutinize what they are presenting as truth, they too have fallen prey to propaganda and brainwashing, just as much as the Columbia students crying for humanitarian aid because they can’t access their campus meal plan while they protest in an encampment.

Why does this ultimately matter? Because the media have given voice to damaging propaganda, which has a far-reaching impact, as we have seen on college campuses and, in turn, K-12 institutions.

I offer a few simple requests to all journalists to recalibrate balance in reporting the news, objectively:

Do your research/ homework about what you are reporting and ensure you fully understand the context
Learn all the facts about the Middle East and Israel, past and present; leverage the plethora of information from reputable sources
Be mindful of the subtleties of choosing images and quotes that can have huge ramifications
Re-read and edit content that is subject to misinterpretation or pushes an agenda

Furthermore, to amplify our message so that the media are left with no questions as we fight a “war on words,” we must speak up with one, cohesive voice — about our story of who we are, what we stand for, and what the factual story of Israel is, past and present.

It was my dream to go to Medill to study journalism; it was known to be the best and I had a wonderful experience. I took incredible pride in my Medill experience and writing at The Daily. Recently, when I worked with an artist to create a custom piece of art that represented mine and my husband’s interests, while he chose old maps he had drawn as a child, I chose an extra copy of The Daily I had from my stockpile of clips — which is now hanging in my living room. It’s unfortunate that what I once considered the best has become unrecognizable.

Please, for the sake of Israel, the United States, and by extension, the Western world, and Jews everywhere, I ask journalists to tell the full story and remind your fellow colleagues of their journalistic duty and ethical obligation that they signed up for — to be objective — before it’s too late.

Rebecca Orbach Glick is a former editor of The Daily Northwestern and Medill alum. She holds a BS in Journalism and Political Science from Northwestern University and MA in Industrial/Organizational Psychology from New York University. Currently, she lives in the Chicago area and has worked in public relations, management consulting and leadership coaching for the last 20+ years. She most recently founded NefeshLiving, a health coaching business. The author is a contributor to HonestReporting, a Jerusalem-based media watchdog with a focus on antisemitism and anti-Israel bias — where a version of this article first appeared.

The post An Ominous Warning: Campus Journalism Fueling the Next Generation of Anti-Israel Media first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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US Moves Patriot Missile Batteries from South Korea to Middle East

A Patriot missile battery. Photo: IDF.

i24 NewsAmerican Patriot missile defense batteries will be moved from South Korea to the Middle East, according to reports in Asian media on Friday, amid speculation over a potential military action against Iran’s nuclear program and escalating bombardments of Iran-backed jihadists in Yemen.

US President Donald Trump threatened Iran on Sunday with bombing and secondary tariffs if Tehran did not come to an agreement with Washington over its nuclear program, and the United States has moved additional warplanes into the region.

Washington and Seoul have reportedly recently agreed on the “monthslong” partial deployment of the Patriot Advanced Capability-3, in what is understood to be the first known case involving the relocation of United States Forces Korea (USFK) assets to the Middle East.

Iran in recent years has largely dropped the pretense of enriching uranium for a civilian atomic energy program, as it’s reportedly teetering on the nuclear precipice. Israel believes that a nuclear Iran represents a grave existential threat, consistent with the exterminationist antisemitism of the Islamic Republic’s anti-Israel rhetoric.

After the election of Trump, a known Iran hawk, the likelihood of an U.S.-Israeli attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities has increased precipitously.

The post US Moves Patriot Missile Batteries from South Korea to Middle East first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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Report: Iranian Plot to Assassinate Azerbaijani Rabbi Foiled

The Azerbaijani capital of Baku. Photo: Wikimedia Commons.

i24 NewsIran enlisted the services of a Georgian drug trafficker to carry out an assassination of a prominent Azerbaijani rabbi, the Washington Post reported Saturday, citing security officials.

The plot to murder Rabbi Shneor Segal, foiled by the State Security Service of Azerbaijan in early January, also involved a plan to attack a Jewish education center, the officials said.

The plot was set in motion by an officer with Iran’s Quds Force, who met with Georgian criminal Agil Aslanov, handing him a photo of Segal and detailed instructions on how to murder him, the officials cited by WaPo said. Aslanov’s fee for the foiled hit was $200,000.

The State Security Service said the two men “worked to collect information about a member of a religious community, and sent the location of his residence and workplace to a representative of a foreign special service agency via the appropriate mobile phone application.”

Iran is known to be behind multiple plots against Israeli and Jewish targets, many of which have been foiled by Israeli and foreign security services.

However a recent plot saw three citizens of Uzbekistan murder an Israeli rabbi in the United Arab Emirates on Iranian orders. The three were sentenced to death earlier this week for the murder of Zvi Kogan in November.

The post Report: Iranian Plot to Assassinate Azerbaijani Rabbi Foiled first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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Netanyahu to Depart for Washington on Sunday Directly from Hungary to Meet with Trump

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu attends a joint press conference with US Secretary of State Marco Rubio at the Prime Minister’s office in Jerusalem, Feb. 16, 2025. Photo: Ohad Zwigenberg/Pool via REUTERS

i24 NewsIsrael’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will depart to Washington DC on Sunday directly from Hungary—where he is presently on an official visit—to meet with US President Donald Trump, i24NEWS learned on Saturday from an Israeli source.

The visit comes following a phone conversation between the leaders on Friday, and a call with State Secretary Marco Rubio a short while ago.

As a result, the planned visit to Washington of Israel’s Defense Minister Israel Katz will be postponed once again.

Topics of discussion between the two leaders are expected to include the possible military action against Iran’s nuclear facilities, the Gaza war and the future of the war-ravaged Palestinian enclave, the US bombing campaign against Iran-backed Houthi jihadists in Yemen, and the recent imposition of tariffs on Israeli products.

The post Netanyahu to Depart for Washington on Sunday Directly from Hungary to Meet with Trump first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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