A November 12 & 13 Carleton University-sponsored event will feature two guest lecturers discussing the subject of the “gravity of the role of journalism during the Israel-Gaza war” and the “brutal experience [of] covering the Israeli military campaign in Gaza.” The two speakers are Gazan writer Shrouq Al Aila and Israeli columnist Gideon Levy.

Unfortunately, while interest and engagement from Canada’s future journalists in trying to understand the Middle East is encouraging, this event’s promotional materials contain several concerning red flags.

Event attendees may think that this is an opportunity to hear multiple perspectives and to learn about the conflict objectively and with balance, due to the participation of both a Palestinian and an Israeli in the discussion. However, despite their different ethnic backgrounds, both speakers essentially share the same anti-Israel opinion.

Alia lives in Gaza and has garnered attention for sharing her takes on the war, during which she tragically lost her husband. The only issue is that she is far from just an objective reporter sharing her experiences. Shrouq regularly falsely refers to the situation in Gaza as a “genocide” — sometimes taking it even further and provocatively calling it a “holocaust” — despite all available firm data refuting this propagandistic characterization. She refers to Israeli hostage rescue operations as “massacre[s]” and describes her own journalism as “writ[ing] for Palestine” and a “way to resist and fight back against Israeli propaganda.” She has been making the same outlandish and baseless claims about Israel allegedly targeting journalists since years before the current war began.

Meanwhile, Levy, whom CBC has previously referred to as the “most hated man in Israel,” is a regular favourite guest in the anti-Israel media landscape, as an Israeli journalist who virulently and consistently fills the niche of attacking the Jewish state, victim-blaming those attacked on October 7th, legitimizing the claims and language of Israel’s most extreme haters, supporting a boycott of his own country, and even advocates the dismantling of Israel as a state. Suffice it to say he does not in any way represent the views of mainstream Israelis on any part of the political spectrum — and to suggest otherwise is brazenly dishonest.

Neither of these known and biased provocateurs — who share the same political views on the situation they’re discussing — instil confidence that this event will constitute a fair and balanced sincere discussion.

Furthermore, the event will be hosted by CBC’s Nahlah Ayed, who also has a long history of wrongdoings when it comes to fairness in covering the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Ayed’s record includes disseminating false quotes and whitewashing murderers. Would any reasonable person expect this to be a balanced conversation?

The event’s promotional materials also raise questions about whether the focus of the lectures will be to peddle the long-discredited false claim that Israel intentionally targets Palestinian journalists — a laughably disingenuous claim that seems not to have any concerns whatsoever about the systemic and complete lack of free press under Hamas rule in Gaza and how Israel actively works to safeguard members of the media from harm, while Islamist terrorists position themselves amongst journalists or who double as journalists themselves. It’s hard to trust the intentions of a discussion about the state of journalism in the conflict that mentions Israel 11 times in its brief promotional blurb while failing to mention the word Hamas even once.

In short, nothing about this event suggests that it will be a serious, fair, or balanced conversation about the issues at hand, but rather another whining session for the echo chamber of Israel haters.

While people have every right to hold any baseless opinions they wish, there are two reasons why that should be considered a bigger problem than usual.

Firstly, as a publicly-funded university, and with a publicly-funded national broadcaster hosting it, Canadians have a right to know what their money is going towards and to have a say in whether they feel it is being abused. Considering that most Canadians reject the extremist and one-sided views of Israel haters, the media should pay attention and inform the public as to whether their money is being exploited in this manner. 

Secondly, this event is taking place under the auspices of a journalism program. Young people interested in taking on the responsibility of becoming our country’s future journalists will be in attendance, trying to learn from the event. Not only does the spreading of bias and misinformation threaten to cloud their ability to fairly cover these issues down the road, but it also sets a terrible example for them in terms of journalistic integrity. Teaching the next generation of journalists that entire sets of facts and viewpoints should be ignored and omitted from stories in order to push ideological positions in a manipulative manner is not going to result in the institution of a robust free press serving its sacred intended purpose in the long run — which endangers all of us and the ability of our democratic norms to function. 

Reporters interested in understanding the realities of how the anti-Israel movement is abusing our institutions should monitor and cover what goes on at this event, and let the public be made aware of any wrongdoings.