News

Ethan Bronner is the New York Times Jerusalem bureau chief. As such, he
is the editor responsible for all the news coming out of
Israel-Palestine. It is his job to decide what gets reported and what
doesn’t; what goes in a story and what gets cut.

To a considerable degree, he determines what readers of arguably the
nation’s most influential newspaper learn about Israel and its
adversaries, and, especially, what they don’t.

His son just joined the Israeli army.

According to New York Times ethics guidelines, such a situation
would be expected to cause significant concern. In these guidelines the
Times repeatedly emphasizes the importance of impartiality.

This is considered so critical that the Times devotes considerable
attention to “conflict of interest” (also called “conflict with
impartiality”) problems, situations in which personal interest might
cause a journalist to intentionally or unconsciously slant a story.

The Times notes that family affiliations may cause such a conflict;
as an example, it explains that a daughter’s high position on Wall
Street could be problematic for a business reporter.

In situations where such a familial affiliation is considered
significant, the journalist may be moved to a different area of
reporting.

Ethan Bronner’s situation, therefore would appear to be sticky, at
the very least. It... >>>