More 'Scare Quote' Bias

One of the ways the media puts across its agenda is through the use of "scare quotes," which are quotes that surround words and phrases to convey a kind of raised eyebrow.

The perennially biased French news agency AFP uses scare quotes constantly in slanting its Middle East coverage, as happened today in a dispatch about Israeli patrols of the Dead Sea:

JERUSALEM (AFP) - The Israeli navy last week reportedly completed trials on the possibility of carrying out regular patrols on the Dead Sea.

The tests were conducted in a bid to prevent infiltration by "terrorists" and the smuggling of weapons from Jordan, the country's privately run Channel Two television said.

The word "terrorists" is put in scare quotes so as to convey the view that Israel isn't interested in terrorism, but in flexing its muscles for no good reason and putting a scare in the poor poor Arabs.