Guardian makes egregious "error"; refers to Palestinian "terrorists" without quotes

A few days ago the Guardian made an egregious “error”. They used the word ‘terrorism’, in the Israeli-Palestinian context, without quotes. Here’s the relevant passage in the online edition of a story about the recent release of a second batch of Palestinian prisoners titled ‘Tension among Israelis after release of 26 Palestinian prisoners‘, Oct. 30:

Of course, anyone who reads the Guardian would know that at least their unofficial editorial policy seems to forbid use such a value-laden term as “terrorist” to refer to Palestinian extremists who murder Israelis, at least without quotations or some other grammatical qualification. More typically, they use the word “militant” instead – even, as seen below, in reference to the 2011 Itamar massacre.

militant — Guardian headline, March 14, 2011

Sure, enough, a mere day after their online “faux pas” about the freed Palestinians, the Guardian “corrected” their “blunder” in the print edition of the paper. In a shortened version of the Oct. 30 story about the released prisoners, the quotes were wrapped safely around the potentially offending term.

Finally, we should note that the one seeming exception to the Guardian ‘no terror without quotes’ policy relates to stories about the murder of innocent civilians by violent extremists which occurs on British soil.

We of course eagerly await a column by the Guardian’s Readers’ Editor explaining the moral difference between the murder of Lee Rigby in London and the murder of more than 1400 innocent Israelis since Oslo.