WBBM AM radio (780) has been reporting that an arson threat has been received by the Presbyterian church "because of its Middle East policies."

[b]That choice of words is a remarkable departure from the Presbyterian Church press release, which reported that the threat specifically says the letter 'threatened to set churches on fire while people were inside in retaliation for "anti-Israel and anti-Jewish attitudes"'[/b] (see AP story link below)

From the words WBBM has chosen,Americans are likely to assume that the threat comes from Arab or Muslim supporters.

I called the WBBM news room (800-784-6397) and asked if I could speak to someone about the way the story was being reported.

The man I forwarded to was initially professional, and checked the wire report - the words he read agreed with AP's report.

When I asked why WBBM chose to say "because of the churches' Middle East policies" instead of reporting what the Presbyterians said, he defended the story by saying that Israel is in the Middle East, so their report was accurate.

I said it was deceptive, we talked a bit more, he said he didn't agree and he wasn't going to spend more time on this.

HELP MAKE THE REPORTING HONEST! Call the news room number above and complain.

You can be confident that if the threat was from Palestinian supporters that would be in WBBM's report, so why should WBBM be allowed to tone down the involvement of Israel supporters?