November 7, 2023 - 7:30pm
US media outlets have been criticised for reporting that a Jewish man who sustained fatal injuries while protesting an anti-Israel demonstration on Sunday had “died”, rather than saying he was killed.
Two counter-protesters, Jonathan Oswaks and Paul Kessler, were holding Israeli flags at a Palestinian demonstration outside Los Angeles when a man with a megaphone began yelling and swung the object at Kessler, Oswaks told the New York Times. Kessler then fell back and hit his head on the ground, dying at the hospital that evening of blunt force head trauma. Multiple onlookers called the authorities and reported the incident as a battery.
Police are currently investigating the incident as a homicide and potential hate crime. Local Jewish and Muslim leaders have discouraged the spreading of rumours about the incident while the investigation is underway.
The media has been surprisingly circumspect, given the evidence, with outlets including CNN, the New York Times and Time reporting that Kessler “died” and declining to state that he was killed. NBC News initially used “Man dies after hitting head” in its headline on the incident before updating it to “Jewish man killed in altercation”, though the outlet did not provide an editor’s note to explain the change.
For legal reasons, journalists generally avoid the word “murder” unless a murder conviction has been handed down. “Killing”, on the other hand, encompasses both intentional and unintentional killing and doesn’t have the same legal implications.
The Associated Press Stylebook provides the following guidance: “Do not say that a victim was murdered until someone has been convicted in court. Instead, say that a victim was killed or slain […] and if not already in the story, specify the nature of the killing.”
Media outlets’ hesitance to label the incident a killing has triggered a widespread backlash, and has been viewed as a form of bias against Jews and supporters of Israel. While online commentators have said that Kessler was struck in the head with a megaphone, that detail has not yet been confirmed by authorities, and Oswaks himself is unsure if the megaphone struck him, according to the NYT.
New York Post columnist Carol Markowicz wrote that “Paul Kessler was murdered” in response to a Time article titled “Jewish man in California dies after confrontation during Israel-Hamas war protests.”
“He was murdered in cold blood by being bludgeoned to death,” media personality Megan McCain wrote in response to the same Time article. “What the hell is wrong with our media?! Do Jewish lives mean so little to so many of you, you can’t even identify when someone is murdered?!”
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SubscribeThe marches in support of Palestinians/Hamas terrorists have been praised in various quarters, including by the Metropolitan Police, for being “largely peaceful”.
When the police turn a blind eye to the commission of countless serious criminal offences such as: encouraging support for a proscribed terrorist organisation, incitement to racial hatred and numerous public order offences, then the hate filled mob can superficially appear peaceful, in the sense of a limited outbreak of violence.
If the police were to properly enforce the law by mass arrest ,and counter protesters did turn up to support the people of Israel, no one could seriously doubt that the “largely peaceful” mob would swiftly reveal themselves as the violent hateful bigots they really are.
Years of intimidating the police and counter protesters has given the muslim and Leftist mob a free hand to take possession of our streets whenever they wish.
One can only praise the brave gentleman who lost his life standing up against the mob. He shames the police, politicians and all of us who have these animals intimidate us into inaction and silence.
In 2002 the deputy assistant commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, Brian Paddick (now Baron Paddick) said: “The concept of anarchism has always appealed to me.”
He made those remarks on an anarchist forum where anarchism is not merely a fluffy “concept”.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/1866274.stm
The police are not your friends.
“If the police were to properly enforce the law by mass arrest ,and counter protesters did turn up to support the people of Israel, no one could seriously doubt that the “largely peaceful” mob would swiftly reveal themselves as the violent hateful bigots they really are.”
Which is why the police wading in with batons to arrest en mass or failing to separate protesters and counter protesters is a really bad idea.
Much better to arrest those those who commit violent criminal acts against people and / or property afterwards using CCTV footage – there are very few places in cities which are not covered by CCTV these days.
Had Kessler made his protest from across the street rather than in the face of a protester he would still be alive. That does not mean the incident should not be properly investigated and then follow legal due process, which may well end up with a conviction for murder.
An unbiased media ought to stick to reporting known facts – that he died is a fact that he was killed is the subject of an ongoing investigation. Many media outlets were rightly criticised for jumping the gun over the Gaza hospital hit by a malfunctioning Hamas rocket.
Killed is the standard practice in reporting these events. I don’t know for sure, but it’s probably in the style guides used by these news outlets. When they say die, it clearly diverges from traditional media practices.
I swear on a stack of bibles when I first saw that headline I assumed the guy died of a heart attack. It’s garbage journalism. Hell, it’s not even journalism. Standard practice is to use the term killed. It doesn’t imply guilt at all. Utterly pathetic conduct from the regime media.
Which is why they’re dying a very public and unsympathetic death. Do you know anyone under age 60 who gives a jot what “the media” says about anything? I’m 65 and the only time I hear about their stupid musings is on podcasts hosted by people younger than my kids. I suppose these dinosaurs give meme generators fodder for their funnies, but, c’mon, formerly “serious” television and print news outlets are done, burnt, and in a can at the end of the driveway.
You’re right. No one is buying what they’re selling anymore.
Whatever the precise circumstances of his death, Paul Kessler was a very courageous man, and a martyr.
George Floyd was killed. BLM. Paul Kessler just died. JLM?
So true, the Floyd was Murdered mantra became standard almost immedieately after the event.
Imagine if this happened to a trans person who was counter protesting. The headlines would be shrieking. The coverage of these events just demonstrates how profoundly antisemitic progressives – including progressive journalists – have become.
The contrast to the reporting on the 2017 Charlottseville killing is incredible.
Reportage on this incident continually and aggravatingly gets the geography wrong. This did not happen “outside Los Angeles”, unless by that you mean anywhere within a 50 mile radius of that city. It happened in Thousand Oaks California and Westlake Village California right on the Ventura County line. These affluent suburban communities are cities in their own right and are not in any way identified with Los Angeles. To say so is to vaguely imply that this is the sort of thing that happens in big urban settings. This incident didn’t.
See the intersection in that photo? I’ve navigated that intersection thousands of times by foot and in my car. My kids attended Westlake High School two blocks away. In fact, I used to ride my bike in that area when there was no such thing as Westlake Village. Thousand Oaks Boulevard, the street seen in the photo, dead-ended before it reached what would eventually be named “Westlake Boulevard”, the street Kessler appears to be about to cross.
Why do I raise this location issue? Because context matters. When riots break out in crowds in Los Angeles, people tend to shrug and say, “Oh, well. Big cities are sort of breeding grounds for this sort of thing.” When it happens in normally quiet suburban cities, it’s import is magnified.
No. This incident didn’t happen “outside Los Angeles”.
It happened in my home town. There are conclusions waiting to be drawn from this unexpected context.
What happened is tragic. But it was a very dangerous situations. Counter-protesters should be forbidden, and forced out of protests. Ideally by public authorities rather than a less lenient “order team” from the protest organizers.
This should apply regardless of who is protesting : the ocunterprotestor is in my opinion always wrong since he came to create a confrontation.
There is a quite short path from couter-protestors crashing in a group to armed militas fighting in the streets.
I did not know the dead guy was a counter protester (not reproted in the press), but I am very happy he was.
So city streets or in this case a neighborhood should just be ceded to the protesters? No challenge or counter-protesting allowed?
You can have an alteernative protest elsewhere. But the short answer is yes.
Every protest is ipso facto a counter-protest. A protest which was not protesting against anything would not be protest at all.
I don’t think that is right.
A protest is, as you say, a protest against something.
But a counter-protest is specifically against another protest.
The Police need to employ large physically fit strong tough men trained in Ju Jitsu who can stop violence and arrest troublemakers without using CS gas,tazers, etc. The Tokyo Riot Police spend a year being trained in Aikido.
They’re great at the macarena
George Floyd died after a bout of police custody.
Paul Kessler died after a bout of police cowardice.
After?
Yes.
Because of?
Have you watched the events as recorded on police body cameras and onlooker videos?