… or just shitty subbing?

Are there any good sub-editors left at The Sydney Morning Herald?

That was the question posed by the bitter, washed-up, hacks who compile this column when they read today’s splash in the Nine Entertainment Co. masthead (at top).

And especially the intro and the opening paragraphs of Lucy Cormack’s piece.

Our compilers didn’t spill a drop as they collectively took about five seconds to fix Lucy’s intro for her. Here it is.

Dubai: Israel has been accused of crimes against humanity in its relentless bombardment of Gaza, with regional leaders bracing for the next phase of the conflict after Israeli ground troops were told they would soon invade the Palestinian enclave on their mission to destroy Hamas.

Simples! We have no idea what the word triggering was meant to convey. That, perhaps somehow, poor Israel, who really is only protecting its right to exist, somehow triggered a “crimes against humanity” accusation rather than being openly and plainly accused of something just as barbaric and inhumane and disgusting as Hamas’s cowardly, unforgiveable, raids into Israel two weeks ago. And perhaps even more so?

The article’s following two pars make it clear that seven United Nations special rapporteurs are not warning about anything, despite the heading on the paper’s lead story.

Seven UN special rapporteurs condemned Israel’s bombing and complete siege of Gaza in response to the killing of more than 1400 civilians and abduction of more than 200 hostages by Palestinian Hamas fighters two weeks ago.

‘‘We are sounding the alarm. There is an ongoing campaign by Israel resulting in crimes against humanity in Gaza,’’ the UN experts said in a strongly worded joint statement.

This column and The Bug generally accept that Australia is very, very pro-Israel. We have a deputy prime minister who reckons the Jewish state is obeying the rules of war as they reduce a place the size of Canberra, only with a couple of million citizens crammed in it instead of 435,000, to rubble so they don’t lose too many troops when they pour in shortly. We have a prime minister who says Hamas and Gaza are to blame for each and every one of the 6000 – probably now 10,000 – Israel rockets that have rained down on it.

When you open the text to Cormack’s piece online, the heading says: UN decries Israel’s Gaza ‘crimes’ It would have taken a bit of tweaking in the hardcopy edition but that heading is much better than a group of experts warning about something.

Once again, our column compilers didn’t spill a drop and easily held their breath for the time it took to come up with:

UN cites
crimes
against
humanity

Too harsh on Israel and its delightful prime minister to discard the word ‘warns’? All Australians are heeding the warnings of a potentially disastrous summer fire season ahead. Warnings can easily suggest things that might or are likely to happen. Those UN special rapporteurs were not warning about anything; they were stating what they factually believed to be the case. Something truly dreadful and unspeakable is happening in Gaza right now.

Still, even as this column comes to an end, our column compilers and The Bug generally remain very mindful of the need not to come across as anti-Semitic in any way, shape or form.

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