To the Editor: Crimson’s Anti-Israel Bias Spills Into a News Article

The latest example of The Crimson’s antisemitic “boycott Israel” editorial stance spilling over into the news columns of the paper in a way that violates good journalistic craft comes in a news article that says, “In recent weeks, Elmendorf has been the subject of controversy. He faced backlash in January over his rejection of a fellowship for former Human Rights Watch head Kenneth Roth. Elmendorf, who allegedly blocked Roth over anti-Israel criticism, reversed his decision after more than 1,000 Harvard affiliates signed an open letter calling for his resignation.”

The New York Times Manual of Style and Usage entry under “allegedly” calls it “police-blotter jargon, best rephrased into conversational English.” A more accurate, more fair, less biased, and better way of providing this context would have been to either cut the whole section or edit it so that read something like:

“Elmendorf reversed himself last month under pressure from faculty members and allowed a fellowship for Kenneth Roth, a former head of Human Rights Watch. The dean has said the initial rejection was based on his evaluation of Roth’s potential contributions to the school. Roth’s critics, including major American Jewish organizations and a founder of Human Rights Watch, say his criticism of Israel has amounted to an obsessive bias that has crossed into antisemitism, and that the claim made by Roth and his allies, with no evidence, that the fellowship was initially blocked by pro-Israel donors echoes antisemitic conspiracy theories.”

Sprinkling the word “allegedly” into a sentence is not some kind of potion that magically provides a pretense of journalistic objectivity in an article that otherwise unskeptically parrots unsubstantiated claims around Roth’s fellowship. It is better journalism to say who is making the allegation, to check whether they have any evidence to support the claim, and to provide additional, alternative points of view.

It’s ironic that the rest of the Crimson article is about a Harvard project to study misinformation and disinformation. And it’s sad that this sort of anti-Israel, anti-Jewish propaganda is being supported by Crimson alumni donors, insulating the journalists from the feedback mechanisms that would ordinarily help to prevent a newspaper from going off the rails in such an extreme and bigoted way.

Ira E. Stoll ’94 is a former Crimson President.