Target: journalists. Will personal probes undermine media?
Hit with tear gas and rubber bullets, the CNN photo editor was already having a rough week. In late July, Mohammed Elshamy was covering protests against the Puerto Rican governor on San Juan’s streets. Then his phone erupted with alerts.
Anti-Semitic tweets Mr. Elshamy had posted in 2011 as a 16-year-old in revolution-rapt Egypt were resurfacing on right-wing accounts. Reactions poured in.
The next day, he apologized to the Jewish community and beyond on Twitter. “I will continue to hold myself accountable for my actions, and work to correct any harm I have caused,” he wrote, noting he no longer relates to the hateful comments made as an uninformed minor. The death threats kept coming. Some reached him by phone. Anti-Muslim slurs mounted against him as the online shaming spread.
“I think that it was very unfair, because I should not be punished as an adult for things that I said as a child,” he says. “I just think it was
A politicized press “Shocked and floored”Fair scrutiny?
