I really have tried to not blog about DouchebloggerTM Richard Silverstein again. After all, his credibility has forever been damaged due to his previous indiscretions, with even the likes of Ha’aretz treating him like poison.
Alas, his combination of mendacity and stupidity provides delicious grist for the mill.
In his latest screw-up, Silverstein has once again fallen for a spoof story.
In this case, he has rushed to attack the Israeli Embassy in Ireland for allegedly posting some offensive and juvenile tweets.
http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:_EuoxU9csjsJ:www.richardsilverstein.com/2014/11/03/israels-dublin-embassy-publishes-new-offensive-social-media-posts/+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=il
Notice how Silverstein once again puts the onus of proof on the target of his allegations, and harps on fact the Embassy did not claim they were hacked.
The embassy claimed, in its tweet, that the messages were “fake” or from a “fake account.” but offered no proof of this. The tweet also claimed it had demanded the forum remove the tweets, when it had done no such thing. It appeared the embassy was intimating, without making a public declaration, that the tweets were a result of the Twitter account being hacked.
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But there was something terribly curious about the response: the embassy released no formal statement. Not an apology as they have in the past, nor a claim of hacking. Nothing. Simply radio silence.
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In the past, the embassy has claimed that Facebook postings in the Embassy timeline were not “authorized.” That appears to be what they’re trying to do again here. Though you can’t do that with Twitter since no one can post a tweet under someone else’s account unless they’ve hacked it. Given that the MFA is refusing to acknowledge hacking, we’ve got to assume that the tweets are authentic. It is possible that they were made by embassy staff who’d “gone rogue.” But given the tone of previous social media posting by this pair, that’s hard to believe.
Yet Silverstein did not do even the minimum of due diligence to ascertain whether these things were even tweeted at all.
Had he done so, he would have discovered – before making a goose of himself yet again – that the alleged tweets were photoshops from a satirical site, something pointed out to him by one of his readers.
Silverstein was forced to amend his post, but instead of merely adding an update, he reworks it to minimize the damage. And in predictable fashion, he can’t bring himself to apologize for his cock-up, but rather launches into some more bizarre attacks against the embassy.
Methinks Silverstein should be less concerned with the reputation of the Israeli Embassy in Ireland and more concerned about his own.
Update: Oh, the irony!
@Jerusalem_Post caught out publishing another false smear, this time w info provided by US anti-Iran group, UANI. http://t.co/Tz3Usgxu9U
— Tikun Olam (@richards1052) November 5, 2014
