Julian Assange: Western Newspapers Hesitant To Publish Israel-Related Leaks

by on Thursday, December 23, 2010 at 12:28 pm in Middle East, Politics, WikiLeaks, World

In a new, largely unreported Al Jazeera interview (with Julian Assange’s responses overdubbed in Arabic), the WikiLeaks founder reveals that he intends to release 3,700 documents pertaining to Israel.

2,700 of these documents, he said, originate from within Israel, and include “Sensitive and classified documents” on the 2006 military excursion into Lebanon (which resulted in the deaths of over 1,200 Lebanese — mostly civilians, and 160 Israelis — mostly soldiers).

The documents also contain information on Mossad assassinations, including the murder of Hamas militant Mahmud al-Mabhuh in Dubai, as well as “a Lebanese military leader in Damascus by sniper bullets.”

The Peninsula , a Qatari newspaper, translated a small portion of the interview into English.  When the interviewer confronted Assange about an accusation (apparently lodged by a former colleague of his) of having cut a secret deal with Israel not to publish their secret files, Assange responded:

This is not true. We have been accused as being agents of Iran and CIA by this former colleague who was working for Germany in the past and was dismissed from his job after we published American military documents related to Germany.

We were the biggest institution receiving official funding from the US but after we released a video tape about killing people in cold blood in Iraq in 2007, the funding stopped and we had to depend on individuals for finance.

The Jerusalem Post published the following on Assange’s revelation as to why we haven’t seen more Israel-related leaks:

Assange said only a small number of documents related to Israel have been published so far because newspapers in the West that had exclusive rights to publish the material were hesitant to publish sensitive information about Israel …

“The Guardian, El-Pais and Le Monde have published only two percent of the files related to Israel due to the sensitive relations between Germany, France and Israel. Even New York Times could not publish more due to the sensitivities related to the Jewish community in the US,” [Assange] added.

It’s rather astonishing to think that the New York Times would publish sensitive information on its own country, the United States of America, but would refrain from publishing sensitive information on a foreign country, Israel.  What are we to make of that?

This unfortunately will continue to be a huge problem for WikiLeaks, OpenLeaks, and other whistleblower groups.  By giving the main stream media exclusive rights to the leak information — essentially the power to serve as middlemen between the documents and the discerning public — they are effectively allowing the corporate-owned media establishment to serve as ideological gatekeepers.

And as we learned from the run-up to the Iraq war, and a long string of other failures over the last decade, the establishment media most often chooses complicity over serving as a check on government power.

In the spirit of promoting true transparency, whistleblower groups should never again entrust just a few major publications in the main stream media to play such a vital role.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20101223/wl_mideast_afp/usdiplomacywikileaksisraelassange

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3 Comments

  • | 581#
    nader paul kucinich gravel mckinney
    Jan 2nd, 2011 at 3:38 pm

    Internet killed Israeli PR
    twin towers, building seven, pentagon, shanksville, anthrax
    Internet killed Israeli PR

  • | 617#
    Blitz
    Feb 6th, 2011 at 1:17 pm

    What patent nonsense. Al Jazeera did not ask him why he doesn’t just post the data on the internet? This is Wikileaks not Pressleaks. It is it’s ability to bypass the mainstream press that makes it what it is. This is the weakness excuse that Assange could offer and no one calls him on it?

    Please!

    • Nov 27th, 2012 at 8:19 pm

      I find myself hainvg to agree with Billy Bob here grrrrr. As sleazy as Assange appears to be, WikiLeaks is still the delivery vehicle of the documents, and not the source stealing the documents. The latter should, most definitely, be found, prosecuted, and appropriately punished.The only way I could see that WikiLeaks/Assange could also be culpable is if it’s found they paid for the source material, making them partners in crime. But that would take some serious sleuth work. Perhaps a Leaking WikiLeaks site needs to start up? heh a WikiLeaks spokesperson does confirm they have contributed to a legal defense fund for Bradley Manning hardly an admission of guilt, and nothing to tie them in as an accomplice.On the whole, I’m much in agreement with all the diplomat correspondence not being surprising, and doubtful it will make much difference in global relations. Only in Obama’s mind were we becoming loved , and it was always a facade that global business was being newly conducted with a happy face.But I will say the diplomatic correspondence doesn’t raise my temperment as much as the exposure of military intel operatives and strategy . Assange’s second data dump. What I find more interesting is that the left leaning media and admin had less venom publicly for that data exposed than they do for this one. Embarrassed diplomats do not equate to loss of intel and dead operatives in our battle theatres. Bizarre priority, if you ask me.Reply