NY Observer > Ethan Bronner

Times Foreign Desk Shake-up!

Michael Calderone — Mon, 08 Oct 2007 11:16:02 -0400

John Burns isn't the only one making a big move these days: several New York Times reporters will be shifting around the world in the coming months, according to two internal announcements. Deputy foreign editor Ethan Bronner will become Jerusalem bureau chief, and there are new assignments for several others, including Edward Wong, Steve Erlanger, Elaine Sciolino, Craig Smith, Robert Worth, Barry Bearak, and Celia Dugger. And Hassan Fattah is leaving the paper altogether; he'll be managing editor of a new English-language, pan-Arab daily. Memos after the jump. read more »

Times Adds Farrell to Baghdad Reinforcements

Observer Staff — Tue, 27 Feb 2007 16:08:34 -0500

The New York Times didn't have to look far for one new Baghdad correspondent: He's already in Baghdad.

Stephen Farrell, a Middle East correspondent for The Times of London, will be switching to the New York Times compound later this year.

"He's a very seasoned war correspondent," said New York Times deputy foreign editor Ethan Bronner.

Bronner noted that the paper has also hired Alissa Rubin, who was the Los Angeles Times' Baghdad bureau co-chief from 2003 to 2005.

In addition to writing dispatches, Farrell has multimedia credentials: He co-writes the British newspaper's "Inside Iraq" blog. A recent entry included a "Video Diary" of a roadside bombing.

"These are people with experience, generally in war and in difficult circumstances, and specifically in Iraq," Bronner said. "We wanted people who have some institutional memory regarding Iraq so we don't start from zero."

John F. Burns, the current Times Baghdad bureau chief, plans to leave this summer to head the London bureau. And Sabrina Tavernise, who spent 22 months in Iraq from 2003 to 2007, has recently left the country. Next month, Tavernise is due to become the Istanbul bureau chief, a job that has been vacant since the contentious 2005 departure of reporter Susan Sachs.

Besides the hires of Farrell and Rubin, the Times is still seeking to fill more slots by summer, most likely with reporters less seasoned in war reporting. On Feb. 26, two openings for one-year rotating reporting jobs were listed on the paper's internal Web site.

-- Michael Calderone

Virulent Anti-Carterism Sweeps Country

Observer Staff — Mon, 08 Jan 2007 13:27:17 -0500

Patrick O'Connor of Palestine Media Watch has an interesting quantitative analysis on the latest exponent of anti-Carterism: Ethan Bronner, who reviewed Jimmy Carter's book in a predictable manner in yesterday's NYT.

Bronner has written 18 articles on Israel and Palestine for the Times since July 30, 2000. In them he quoted 1226 words from Israelis, and just 145 words from Palestinians. For example, in the Week in Review on July 30, 2000, after the failure of Camp David, and two months before the outbreak of the 2nd Palestinian intifada which has continued for the last six and half years, Bronner counseled that "no explosion... occurred, nor is chaos expected any time soon." The peace process' "positive direction in the long term is clear." [!] Bronner quoted 228 words from Israelis and 67 words from a Palestinian in that less than prescient analysis. It could be asserted that Bronner is unfairly penalized for reviewing four books by Israelis and one book by a Palestinian. However, eliminating those five reviews worsens his ratio, yielding 1045 words quoted from Israelis, and 97 words quoted from Palestinians.