A New York Times-owned radio station rejected an advertisement by the American Jewish Committee.
AJC Executive Director David Harris on his blog said WQXR-FM, a New York-based station, declined to accept a 60-second ad describing the plight of Israeli residents of Sderot. Harris records a weekly radio spot that airs nationally.
Harris quoted a written statement by the station’s general manager, Tom Bartunek, as saying that “several elements of the spot are outside our bounds of acceptability.”
Bartunek, who is also the president of New York Times radio, said the ad “runs the risk of raising anxiety in a misleading way.” He also said the rocket fire in Sderot, which the ad describes as arriving “day or night,” is also “subject to challenge as being misleading, at least to the degree that reasonable people might be troubled by the absence of any acknowledgement of reciprocal Israeli military actions.”
Bartunek also cited the ad for not meeting the station’s “guidelines for decorum.”
The spot was broadcast several times on the CBS radio network.
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