KINSELLA: CBC's 9/11 climbdown acknowledges historical reality

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It’s true: CBC said 9/11 wasn’t a terror attack.

I received the email on Wednesday. The source(s) wished to remain confidential. The email was from Basem Boshra, the “Senior Director of Journalistic Standards and Public Trust at CBC News.” It was addressed to all CBC news staff and was “for internal use only.”

When I read it, I saw why.

“Hello all,” Boshra wrote. “With the 25th anniversary of 9/11 approaching and the considerable amount of planned coverage, this is an opportune time to share relevant and longstanding guidance from the CBC Language Guide for the purpose of consistency across all CBC News platforms.”

Boshra offered guidance on punctuation. Then he wrote this, in bold and italics:

“Do not refer to the Sept. 11 attacks as terrorist attacks . The hijackings led to passenger jet crashes in Washington, D.C., Pennsylvania and Manhattan. The World Trade Center was destroyed.”

I read it again, and again. The Sept. 11, 2001 attacks — in which 2,996 people were murdered by al-Qaeda terrorists — was not, CBC had decreed, “terrorism.”

I let my editors know what I had, and then contacted CBC’s official spokespeople to (a) ask them if the email was authentic and (b) if they had anything else they’d like to say about what was, on its face, ludicrous.

They got back to me, promptly and professionally. It was real, I was told. And: they stood by it. They piously defended it. Other news agencies, they said, had the same policy (insane, but mostly true). And, they added, CBC had long refused to call terrorism “terrorism” (also insane, also mostly true).

We published the story , and it went viral.

Global outrage

The story was picked up around the world. And people got very, very mad at CBC.

A sampling:

• Maureen Basnicki, whose businessman husband Ken was murdered on 9/11: “ My husband was 1 of 24 Canadians murdered by terrorists in the terrorists attacks on September 11th.!!!! “

• Holocaust scholar Deborah Lipstadt: “ A form of 9/11 denial brought to you courtesy of the CBC. ”

• FBI Director Kash Patel: “A bastardization of history and insult to the souls lost during our largest terrorist attack in U.S. history … WE WILL NEVER FORGET 9/11 .”

• Former Alberta Premier and Harper cabinet minister Jason Kenney: “ Appalling .”

• Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs: “Sanitizing the most infamous acts of terror in modern history as mere ‘hijackings that led to crashes’ is a complete collapse of journalistic standards . Ideology should never replace facts at our national public broadcaster.”

• Mike Fegelman, Honest Reporting: “ Warren Kinsella’s reporting should be a breaking point . Nineteen al-Qaeda terrorists hijacked four planes and deliberately murdered thousands of people in pursuit of an ideological objective. Calling that terrorism is not bias. It is accuracy… Kinsella deserves credit for exposing just how absurd [CBC] culture has become.”

• U.S. House Republicans: “ 9/11 was a terrorist attack . The radical left (Canadian Broadcasting Company) is trying to rewrite history, but there is nothing controversial, complicated, or unclear about this. 9/11 was terrorism.”

Our scoop made big news, or front-page news, in the New York Post , Jerusalem Post , Times of Israel , Daily Mail , Fox News and many others. Unsurprisingly, it was ignored by media who had adopted the same thoughtless practice as CBC.

Liberals react

The most notable statement, however, didn’t come from the Director of the FBI, or the House Republicans and their 1.7 million followers. It came, quietly, from a Liberal Member of Parliament, Anthony Housefather:

“September 11, 2001 was a terrorist attack,” Housefather said , without adding any weasel words or qualifications about journalistic independence. “In the past, CBC has called it a terrorist attack…Rational leadership at the CBC should ensure it continues to do so.”

Housefather then added a CBC story where the CBC had, in fact, previously termed the 9/11 attacks a “ terrorist attack .” In effect, calling management the taxpayer-funded broadcaster liars.

Anthony Housefather is a senior and veteran Liberal MP. He’s been the chair of the House Human Rights Committee. He’s been a junior minister in several departments. He’s been the Chair of the Canada-Israel Interparliamentary Group.

I told my editors that, of all the many outraged statements made about CBC’s cruel and thoughtless policy, Housefather’s was the most significant. It meant that, within the Mark Carney Liberal government, something was up.

I was right. Late on Friday, a shocking statement landed. The Minister of Public Safety, Gary Anandasangaree, issued a statement . In part, it read: “The Government of Canada has always recognized 9/11 as the deadliest terrorist attack in history, and we unequivocally condemn terrorism in all its forms.”

He went on: “On the day of this deadly terrorist attack, Canadians stood with our American neighbours, including the families in Gander who opened their homes to thousands of stranded airline passengers, showing friendship and solidarity in a time of crisis.”

That statement appeared at 4:14 p.m. on Friday. Exactly 30 minutes later, another statement was issued, this time from the CBC’s Basem Boshra, who authored the now-infamous email that had been leaked to me.

CBC changes course

“CBC News finds itself once again in a swirl of confusion about how our journalists use the words ‘terrorist’ and ‘terrorism,’” he wrote. “The confusion stems from the leak of an excerpt from our internal language guide that was published … without full context or explanation.”

After a lot of blame-shifting and rationalizations, Boshra wrote this: “After reviewing our current language guidance, we have decided to adjust it to clarify that … the historic events of 9/11 [were] terrorism .”

“Clarify.” Less than an hour after the CBC’s climbdown, another stunning statement landed, by Marc Miller, the Minister ultimately responsible for the CBC. Miller linked to the CBC statement and wrote : “A welcome change to what was a piece of pedantic and foolish guidance that caused legitimate anger.”

“Pedantic and foolish.” Those words are going to echo around CBC’s hallways for a long, long time.

This newspaper, meanwhile, is proud to have played a role getting the taxpayer-funded broadcaster to acknowledge the historical reality. Namely, that 9/11 was a terror attack.

Which has always been the truth.

— Warren Kinsella is the author of the bestselling The Hidden Hand, about how antisemitic propaganda has infiltrated media.