Helsingen Sanomat and Aftenposten on the Aftonbladet blood libel

Tundra Tabloids lambasts finnish newspaper Helsingen Sanomat for its bias. This might well be correct. Reading the TT translations it certainly appears as if the HS is giving Swedish Aftonbladet’s blood libel (IDF kills Palestinians to steal their organs) the benefit of doubt. From TT:

Israel is always guilty, and even when it’s clearly not, the HS uses the safety net of their supposed “neutrality to report it as just a “he said- she said” incident, thereby equating those spinning gross blood libels with the condemnations coming from the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs. That’s what HS’s Kalle Koponen did in today’s article on the incident, in:

“Israel raivostui Aftonbladetissa julkaistusta artikkelista / Israel furious over article published in the Aftonbladet,

The journalist, Kalle Koponen, dutifully gives the details surrounding the Israeli reaction to the publication of the story, but then repeats the unsubstantiated accusations by the Swedish journalist, Donald Boström, in a typical “he said-she said” fashion. Instead of investigating the journalist in question, the HS instead, simply chooses to report his views without questioning the veracity of his highly ludicrus claims.

Yet TT can count themselves lucky – Norwegian Aftenposten, the HS equivalent, hasn’t picked up on the story at all. That said, Aftenposten does offer a loony-bin debate forum where Boström’s article is being discussed. A much repeated argument seems to be: Well maybe this story is a bit far-fetched, but it might as well be true. That’s how Norwegians have been drilled into perceiving Israel.

Just nice, clean,  legitimate criticism of Israel, eh? Same as any other state, yeah?

Nice going, Mr. Stanghelle (Aftenposten editor).