Helen Thomas was probably the greatest American journalist in modern times. She passed away one week ago at age 92. The woman lived through the terms of ten American presidents and Barack Obama said that she kept all these presidents nervous and waiting for her precise and embarrassing questions. Nevertheless, I will select from her biography this dialogue that she had with a Jewish rabbi who had a tape recorder: Q. We are now covering the month of the Jewish heritage. Do you have any comment about Israel? A. Tell them to get the hell out of Palestine. Q. Wow! Do you have a better comment? A. Remember, these people are under occupation in their own country. This is not Germany or Poland. Q. Where would they go (meaning the Israelis)? A. To their countries. Q. Which is where? A. Poland, Germany, America and anywhere else. The Palestinians have been living there for centuries. Their land is now occupied. I had published the above in this same column on 27/06/2010. The entire piece was about Helen Thomas. Her dialogue with the rabbi stirred a huge fuss that ended up with her resigning from the Hurst Group. She had also previously resigned from the United Press Agency where she had worked for around 60 years. I agree with what Helen Thomas told the rabbi and I add that the talk concerned Israel rather than the Jews. I guess she was alluding to the settlers more specifically. However, this was an opportunity to get back at this journalist with the Lebanese origins, who was at the head of the White House correspondents' society and who, for thirty years, asked the first question and concluded every press conference with the words, "Thank you Mr. President." She was accused of being biased to the Arabs in the questions she asked; but I say that only war lovers who support the occupation and the killing of children are biased towards Israel. George W. Bush always tried to avoid taking the first question from her or answering her questions. She had once said that the war against Iraq was based on fabricated evidence and thousands of Iraqis and Americans were killed. If the reasons for the war were neither related to oil nor to Israel, then what were they? Bush had no answer and she interrupted him time after time. The president's spokesperson, Tony Snow, got back at her by responding to one of her questions and saying: Thank you for presenting Hezbollah's point of view. Helen Thomas used to criticize everybody, especially the Arab states. Barack Obama offered her a birthday cake to which she responded by criticizing the performance of his Administration, knowing that they were both born on the same day, August 4. I had closely followed up on her work while I was living in Washington in the 1980s. I do not claim today that I know her in person. I had only spoken to her for a few minutes during some press conferences. After hearing the news about Helen Thomas' death, I was afraid that the war mongers and the Israeli evil gang would attack her, while she would be unable to respond. However, the majority of the columns written about her were very positive. Female journalists wrote about how Helen Thomas paved the way for them. I also read similar positive comments of the sort on Twitter. Sheila Weller wrote a piece about her in the Washington Post under the headline: "Helen Thomas did so much right but is tombstoned for one wrong." The piece was mostly a positive one. The author did not even refer to the "wrong", although she thought that Thomas made a "hideous" mistake when referring to Israel. I do not think this was a mistake or even a wrong. The Christian West killed the Jews or failed to protect them as they were being killed. It then helped the surviving Jews to occupy Palestine and displace its people, maybe in order to get rid of the Jews from Europe so that they stop reminding them of how they wronged them. What I am saying today is that Helen Thomas was the only "man" among the White House reporters. Some of these reporters had conspired with the Bush Administration in the war that led to the killing of one million Arabs and Muslims. Today, there are no more journalists in America, but rather "stars" with their own TV shows. Journalists now care more for their looks rather than the subject of the episode. [email protected]
