An experienced and senior journalist like Raviv Drucker should know what is expected to happen if you throw shit on a fan.
Should know, and yet he decided to throw such a large block in prime time, and also in controversial timing, less than two weeks before the election.
The episode of "The Source" about Nir Hefetz, "State witness number 1", was everything you would expect it to be.
A long and comprehensive propaganda broadcast against Netanyahu and his family, which was split into two parts (continuation: next Thursday), and whitewashed under the auspices of the public's right to know.
Channel 13 paid its source NIS 300,000 to produce the aforementioned explosive event, an event whose public importance depends on the observer's angle of vision and political bias.
Nir Hefetz is a dubious and biased source - Drucker makes this clear right at the beginning of the program.
"Few people I despised more than Nir Hefetz. I once wrote him the most difficult text messages I ever wrote," the interviewer said at the beginning of the meeting, and then Hefetz clarified that he kept a copy of those embarrassing messages;
As if hinting to Drucker about some secret card he holds against him.
clarified that an object is a questionable source.
Drucker, photo: Network 13 screenshot
But Hefetz didn't need it to dominate the interview.
Drucker and Hefetz have common interests, and each of them made sure throughout the dozens of filmed meetings between them, from the last two years, to respond to the other so that this project would rise.
Hefetz was photographed rummaging through photo albums and provided recordings of private conversations with Sara Netanyahu and members of the bureau;
Drucker rarely asked hard questions, and was carried away by the picturesque stories that fed him all the way to the country.
"I was drawn to see how decisions are made at the state level, how a meeting between the Prime Minister of Israel and the President of the United States is conducted," said Hafetz about why he agreed to enter Netanyahu's office when he received the offer from him. However, Drucker is not really interested in hearing about the daily work, the crises and The combines. Hefetz did not provide him with such information, did not reveal tricks and did not even steal secrets about Bibi Netanyahu. What he did do throughout the long conversation was mainly to smear and blacken. One after another, Hefetz closed accounts with Natan Eshel and Ilan Yeshua, provided explanations for his actions and concentrated on throwing darts at Sara Netanyahu.
Sara knows how to play her, and the wife of the opposition leader certainly starred in the first part of the interview. Murmurs upon murmurs of the lady (starting from asking to scold Dana Weiss to a demand to secure the family's unoccupied house in Jerusalem) were played and transcribed on the screen with the addition of circus background music, As if it was a scene from "Big Brother" with the seasonal mookion. There is no doubt what kind of narrative Drucker was trying to convey about the one who, according to them, runs the country and her husband.
Sarah Netanyahu starred in the episode, photo: Network 13 screenshot
The rest of the episode focused on the various ways in which Netanyahu acted during his term of office, through his son Yair, to send arms into the media and influence their content - which, as we know, is the basis for all the various accusations for which he is now on trial.
In the end, Drucker got all the dirt he was looking for and will probably soon receive the label of beloved of the RLB camp. Chafetz also earned a lot - 300 thousand for an interview that whitewashes his name and work and allows him to burn his opponents. But what did we as viewers gain? We knew it all , more or less, and so the dramatic event they promised felt like a festive episode of "Game of Thrones", one in which everyone stabs everyone in the back in front of the entire nation.
In recent days, Drucker has gone out of his way to defend himself from the criticism he received in preparation for the program.
He was interviewed again and again, explaining the motives for the broadcast, the problematic timing and the payment to the interviewee.
"News 12 also paid tens of thousands of shekels for a recording of Yair Netanyahu," Drucker reminded his viewers, to make it clear: they are all captives in a tangle of interests.
But when a journalist has to sweat in order to explain so much why he published something that by definition is considered "sensational and important", it means that he also understands that he exceeded the normal norms and limits of journalistic ethics.
Too bad, for decades they have been trying to explain to us in every possible way: a suspicious object must not be touched.
And don't get too close.
Source: Interview with Nir Hefetz - State Witness Number 1, Network 13, 9:15 p.m
were we wrong
We will fix it!
If you found an error in the article, we would appreciate it if you shared it with us