Mr. Jørgen Lohne is Aftenposten’s correspondent in the Middle East. As an “ear on the ground” for Aftenposten, a larger Norwegian daily, he is pretty much an “ear on the ground” for all of Norway. On August 18th Aftenposten published one of Mr. Lohne’s stories – about how his pet dog Maja is acclimatizing to her new surroundings in Jordan. On the very same day Mr. Donal Boström had his Israeli-soldiers-stealing-organs-story published in Swedish Aftonbladet. Between the two of them, they’ve got the Middle East pretty well covered.
Dear Mr. Lohne
I just want to thank you for taking the trouble to write an entire article on how your dog – a five year old golden retriever by the name of Maja – is adjusting to life in Jordan. Things must be very new and strange for her, I am sure.
Meanwhile in neighboring Sweden Mr. Boström has written an article in Aftonbladet on how Israeli soldiers kill Palestinians in order to gouge out their organs and sell them to the highest bidder. Some say this is classic anti-Semitism of the vilest sort, others say no, this is fine criticism of the apartheid state. Among the latter we find Swedish author Jan Guillou whom Mossad, Dagbladet recently told us, plotted to kill back in 1968. Even though Mr.Boström’s article has developed into quite an international scandal, we Norwegians haven’t heard much of it. True, there is an editorial in DagenMagazinet and a note in Stavanger Aftenblad but beyond that – nothing. This is just as it should be! We Norwegians don’t need to know about this sort of thing.
What we need is to learn more about your dog.
Yours sincerely
NIJ
In all honesty, Mr. Lohne cannot – in this case – be blamed for supplying Aftenposten with the material which the public demands. We all like to read about dogs, they are nice animals and man’s best friend. Problems occur when editors cowtow to the public demand for hate-pornography, which is what Aftonbladet just did. What editor Stanghelle of Aftenposten needs to do now is give Mr. Lohne free reign – let us see some bold journalism here.
