The AP’s coverage of Rav Chaim’s levaya was highly inaccurate and demeaning, and frankly they’ve again been exposed as a “news” agency that is clueless about the facts and cannot be trusted.
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The story diminished the greatness of this revered Torah giant and unifying leader, attempted to make the Charedi community look silly, and got multiple facts wrong. Sadly, this disturbing pattern has been happening for years and it’s time for us to call out the AP and the rest of the mainstream media.
Here is a direct quote: He [Rabbi Kanievsky] came to public prominence at the start of the coronavirus pandemic when he instructed his followers that closing religious seminaries was more harmful than the virus. He later walked back those claims as infections raged in densely populated Bnei Brak.
He came to public prominence at the start of the pandemic? That is patently false. While there have been many other Charedi leaders, Rav Chaim has been a revered and prominent Gadol for many decades, arguably the past 50 or 60 years. Even a simple look at his Wikipedia page clearly debunks the APs inexcusable depiction. Just because the AP only heard of him recently, does not make it fact.
In addition, regarding Covid and the vaccine issue, he became a very strong leader, and was devoted to public health (whether you agree or disagree with his stances). Even the Israeli government saw him as an ally, which was unprecedented. This is something the AP should be heralding, yet they not only ignored it, they demeaned him and completely mischaracterized his role.
On a broader scale, Rav Chaim was a giant and a man who was awed, respected and revered by many diverse communities. He was immersed in learning all day, in a tiny apartment, yet hundreds of thousands of people from a broad spectrum sought his advice and counsel, including top secular leaders who probably disagreed with him on fundamental issues. There are almost no words to describe his greatness.
It’s time for the AP to stop pretending to know while they make up facts. You cannot claim to be a news agency and write stories based on a random TV soundbite or a headline in a leftist newspaper. Stop pretending to be an insider who understands the facts on the ground.
The AP can choose to do its homework and spend time on the ground speaking with people who know the facts. Or the AP can stop reporting on these topics altogether.
We don’t think that they would be terribly missed.
Yaakov M hosts “The Yaakov M Show” on the VIN News podcast, where he discusses conservative politics and offers passionate, thought-provoking analysis. It’s fun, fast-paced, substantive…without the fluff. He has hosted a political talk show for 15 years. WARNING: Contents may be addictive.
The New York Times also has a poorly written article. These are written by non-frum people for goyim. They will never capture the facts in a meaningful way.
While its true that AP knows very little about the charaide community, the same can be said about our knowledge of the non charaide world. We are very quick to put all non charaide people in the same judgmental criteria without the due process of trying to fully understand the uniqueness and differences amongst all different types of peoples. We as a community are very quick to label and judge others, yet we demand that others give us the respect that we arent giving to others.
Who cares?
The press doesn’t want to be right. This want to sell articles to their readers. Don’t think that if you ‘educate’ them, that they’ll see things in the same light as you.
Just don’t read it and move on.
They as well as other israeli secular papers reduced the amount of people attending the levaya. They said half million. Israeli secular papers said 350 thousand. Reality there were over 750 thousand,perhaps a million. But secular israeli papers are afraid chareidim are taking over israel in twenty short years. Today fifty percent of first graders are chareidim.
The real question is, and the stance that should be made – why is this author so enamored with getting the news about Gedolim from AP, why do we give AP any credence at all? Just like they know nothing about inside workings of Yiddishkiet, they know just as little about coronavirus and the workings of Putin. Stop giving these “news” outlets any more exposure by republishing articles from them.
Unfortunately Yaakov M might be misreading the AP article, but then pretty much everything posted here from the Yaakov M show is shallow drivel.
I am not defending the AP article in any way or suggesting they give proper respect to R’ Kanievsky, however the comment about “public prominence” is almost certainly referring to the non-Charedi world, not the Charedi world. Admittedly the wording in the AP article is not very clear but the context of the article does not seem to suggest he was not already very influential in the Charedi world prior to COVID.
But sure, go on a tirade if it makes you feel better.
The AP is Always Propaganda and therefore should not be expected to be a source of anything related to the truth.
Perhaps it is time for us to remind the gentiles we don’t recall anything negative about a person (especially if he had regrets, and went to the other extreme) unless his misdeeds are known to all, and likely to be used as an example (Heaven forbid!) This is especially true after that person is deceased (and even gentiles roared over the “cheap shot” on Gus Grissom about 40 years ago.)
The AP does not know the Charaidie community and that is the answer in a nutshell. They should be more in tune with the subject matter before writing about it.
What’s really amazing is you made this whole rant, and did you disagree or cite one actual fact? The only thing you specifically quoted and disagreed with was the definition of “public prominence”. I don’t know what criteria they’re using for it, but, with a potential worldwide audience in the hundreds of millions, someone who’s revered by less than a million people, and even heard of by a maximum of 10 million more (and I’m being very generous with these guesstimates) wouldn’t be considered of public prominence (Again, it’s relative, but they’re writing for a global audience). A parallel example. The former governor of Indiana, Mike Pence, was obviously well known in the state and in the broader Republican circles, but I think it’d be fair to say that he came to public prominence when Trump chose him as his running mate.
You need to take a deep breath and reflect before you post a rant. Is there another example of something disrespectful in the article?
Nothing new. Phineas knows this and does the same thing.
Fake news is about telling facts and but webbing together fake stroes and lies. Like when you select which facts to include so the readers view can get distorted and fail to see big pciture. That’s why I always say I don;t care about facts , I care about the true story.