Tonight during a commercial break for The Ambassador, I flicked the channel over to Israel’s Channel 1, and caught part of an interview with Tony Blair.
The interview was conducted by two Israeli journalists – one male and one female. The male’s English was passable – I seem to recall him even using the word “ramifications” – but the woman’s was quite horrendous. At one point, she mispronounced a word so badly that Prime Minister Blair was visibly on the verge of laughing.
But worse than the woman’s English was her effort to be informal with the Prime Minister, evidenced by prefacing one of her questions with “Can I ask you a personal question..not too personal, of course.” Call me old fashioned, but a nationally televised interview with one of the world’s most powerful leaders is no time to be “cute.” The question itself was not much better, with the woman referring to Blair as a “left-wing intellectual.” The Prime Minister was evidently surprised by this characterization (perhaps because he is generally considered to be a moderate who moved the Labor Party away from its leftist roots to embrace more mainstream centrist policies), but, to his credit, remained calm and friendly.
Did anyone else see this interview? I would be interested in your thoughts.
Update: Still on the subject of Israeli journalism, Allison draws our attention to the fact that the pitiful Maariv Internation edition is no more. I say pitiful, since its coverage was far more limited than that of Ha’aretz or JPost, and the English was on a par with that of the female reporter who interviewed Tony Blair tonight.
And on the subject of The Ambassador, so long Dafna. I expect that Harry is not a happy camper.
