OK, now I will admit that I am confused. Willing to forgive, maybe, but still confused--and darn suspicious of this Aaron Klein, and also of WorldNet Daily.
WND's Klein posts a new article this morning, under the headline,"Stop Attacking Fox News."
Klein now flatly asserts that he doesn't think that Fox News paid a ransom to win the freedom of FNC journalists Steve Centanni and Olaf Wiig. Klein now writes, "I can can state categorically I don't believe Fox News paid any money or knew any money was paid." And he adds, with a note of regret, "Unfortunately, many used my article to claim Fox News paid the ransom – a contention I never made or implied."
OK, that's pretty good for November 20. Unfortunately, back on November 14, Klein was sounding, and implying, a different tune. A look back at that piece shows plenty of slippery language, such as this: "Palestinian terror groups and security organizations in the Gaza Strip received $2 million from a U.S. source in exchange for the release of Fox News employees Steve Centanni and Olaf Wiig, who were kidnapped here last summer, a senior leader of one of the groups suspected of the abductions told WND."
And then, lower in the same 11/14 piece, was this headline: "Fox source says it's possible" To repeat, that was a headline--hard to miss!
And then this text, underneath that header: "A spokeswoman for Fox News Channel told WND she could not provide an official statement about whether Fox was aware of money paid to free its two employees." Note the weasely phrasing from Klein here: The Fox News spokeswoman "could not provide an official statement"--the clear implication being that the the spokeswoman might have something to Klein on deep background.
But then Klein adds this: "A source at Fox told WND many parties were involved with the freedom of Centanni and Wiig, including the U.S. government, and that it was possible money was paid." What "source" was that? Who might that be? Klein wants us to think that FNC is filled with people willing to talk with him--and that he gleaned his information from a mosaic of different sources, so it must be true. But it's more likely that he got one spokeswoman from FNC on the phone, and that she told him nothing--which hasn't stopped Klein from spinnning his web of innuendo every which way since.
But then, just to stamp home the insinuation that Fox paid the ransom, Klein added this on Nov 14: "A State Department spokesman said his agency did not pay for the release of the Fox News employees." Klein treats that denial at face value.
Thus the clear conclusion to be drawn from Klein 11/14 story: Somebody paid a ransom--"a U.S. source." But that source was not the US government. And FNC denies it, sort of, but not very convincingly, in Klein's telling. So who's left to have paid the money? Some American sugar daddy? That's possible, of course--but it's hard to shake the impression, which Klein clearly wanted to leave, that the "U.S. source" was connected to FNC somehow.
Klein's real point, in writing his November 14 piece, was to attack whoever was paying the money to the Gaza Palestinians. His argument, no doubt correct, was that any ransom money would go to finance terror: As Klein wrote of one such Palestinian figure a week ago: "The terror leader, from the Gaza-based Popular Resistance Committees, said his organization's share of the money was used to purchase weapons, which he said would be utilized 'to hit the Zionists.' He said he expects the payments for Centanni and Wiig's freedom will encourage Palestinian groups to carry out further kidnappings." So that's the angle that Klein was working: He was obviously outraged at the Palestinians getting more money for terror, and wanted his readers to be outraged, too. But the problem was that in seeking to stoke up outrage, he was tarring Fox.
No wonder FNC went ballistic on Klein and WND, followed by other observers and bloggers--including yours truly, on 11/16.
And now, on 11/20, Klein says that he was misunderstood. But he is still weaseling around, still picking on Fox, to wit, this whining graf from the new piece, in today's WND: "Prior to the release of the article, I asked Fox News repeatedly over the course of two weeks for comment. The network was told exactly what would be in my report. But Fox's public-relations department refused to issue a statement." Oh boo hoo for Klein. In other words, it's Fox's fault for not talking to him.
And then it gets worse; here's what Klein writes next, which makes me so mad that I am bolding it for emphasis: "Off the record, Fox News sources admitted it was possible the terror gangs were paid off by an entity involved in the negotiations and that the news channel did not know about it. " There's the sleazy journalist's friend: the imaginary "off the record" source. But Klein is so sleazy that he even violates the "otr" source's confidentiality! If that source exists, which I strongly doubt, he or she should be outraged! But Klein shouldn't worry: just as you can't libel the dead, neither can you outrage the non-existent.
And by the way, who is Klein talking to? Here's a revealing passage from the new piece, which echoes some of the author's bragadoccio from the original story: "I talked over the course of one month to the terror cell of the alleged kidnappers; to leaders of the overall terror group suspected of the abductions; to various other terror gangs and security organizations in the Palestinian territories." Got that, reader? Klein is in thick with the terrorists.
Does such hanging with terror homeboys make Klein a trustworthy and reliable journalist for WND? Or do such associations, make him a potential stooge for the bad guys? A "useful idiot" for evil doers?
This story needs more investigating, but it looks to me as if Klein is someone who would easily and recklessly smear Fox News, endangering the lives of legitimate journalists across the Middle East, all for the sake of a quick buck or a cheap headline.
