A CiF Watch follower on Facebook named Rafi recently contacted us concerning an article in The Telegraph in late September which included the erroneous claim (in the strap line) that an El-Al flight was delayed “for hours” because of disruptions by Ultra-orthodox Jews”.
How did he determine the error? Well, he did some basic fact-checking by searching for the departure and arrival times on El-Al’s Live Flight Tracker. As it turns out, the flight departed 24 minutes late and arrived 14 minutes late compared to the previous 7 day average.
Here’s the graphic he created to illustrate the error.
Rafi pointed out that the story was the most read article on that day and later for the entire week – per the area circled in the graphic.
After multiple attempts by Rafi to get the claim revised, Telegraph editors eventually did change the strap line and removed the erroneous claim.
Rafi added that they never posted a correction or acknowledged the error, but “just edited it on the sly”.
As CiF Watch counts on such vigilance by our many fans in keeping the media honest, please don’t hesitate to contact us if you spot a factual error at the Guardian (or elsewhere in the UK media).
You can email us at contactus@cifwatch.com, or like our Facebook page and send us a message.
(To those of you in Israel, here’s information on an upcoming CAMERA workshop for activists who want to hone their skills to counter and correct biased media coverage of Israel.)
COMMITTEE FOR ACCURACY IN MIDDLE EAST REPORTING AND ANALYSIS
