An Obadiah Slope column
Taking the plunge: Obadiah took his daughter to brunch yesterday. Reporting that family event might seem boring, but the choice of venue might be more interesting to patient readers. We went to “Plunge,” a cafe on the main drag of Summer Hill, two suburbs over from home. Why there? It is owned by the same people who run the Cairo Takeaway in Enmore, which was the subject of media entrapment this week.
“‘Deliberate, orchestrated incident’: Daily Telegraph caught up in stunt gone wrong” is how the Sydney Morning Herald headlined their account of an incident at the Cairo Takeaway, “an Egyptian restaurant with a cult following on Enmore Road in Newtown.” A man wearing a Star of David cap approached the cafe, which features a Palestinian flag on a mural and strongly supports the people of Gaza on its social media.
“According to the restaurant’s version of events, a Jewish man wearing a Star of David cap entered the premises and ordered a tea before making a series of provocative comments to staff, in an apparent attempt to goad them into a heated argument,” the Herald reported.
The restaurant’s owner, Hesham El Masry, told the paper that a reporter from the Daily Telegraph Danielle Gusmaroli was waiting on the street near the restaurant with a photographer and videographer in tow.
The Jewish man has told the Herald that he denies trying to provoke the workers at Egyptian Takeaway. However, the paper also reports that “leaked documents revealed the Telegraph had hatched a premeditated plan to tail the man, who is Jewish, as he went “undercover” to “see what it’s like being Jewish” in a string of multicultural Sydney suburbs, covertly filming his interactions.
Obadiah thinks that with two groups in our society, the Jewish and Arabic communities, feeling the stress of the war in Gaza, the last thing we need is media entrapment.
The last thing local Jewish or Arabic businesses need is people stirring things up.
So Obadiah and his daughter chose the local branch of that family’s business to order a very nice brunch.
And Obadiah would think it appropriate to go to a Jewish business subject to similar entrapment.
Yes, this item might come across as a “both sides now” piece. Or worse, suggesting a moral equivalence idea about Gaza. It isn’t: working out the moral balance or even the just war status of either side is well above Obadiah’s pay grade. This item is a protest against really poor journalism.
The Guardian reported “Ben English, the editor of the Daily Telegraph, said the newspaper “never intended to provoke an incident at the Cairo Takeaway restaurant” but acknowledged “our approach could have been better handled”.
English said the paper had visited multiple venues across Sydney in an attempt to report on “the rise of antisemitism and … how it is affecting the daily lives of Jewish people in Sydney.” Obadiah thinks it would be better to wait till people come to the paper rather than send someone into businesses. That’s a set-up, if not entrapment. Let’s not risk it. And it is worth asking if the Telegraph would seek out anti-Islamic incidents.
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The myth of equality: A note on Obadiah’s local community Facebook group
“Hi,
“I teach at Cabramatta High School.
“Looking for a 2nd hand laptop for a Yr 11 student whose roof collapsed. They lost everything as asbestos was present, and they weren’t allowed to retrieve any belongings. (see roof collapses in Cabramatta unit block)
“I also have refugee students i support who would love a laptop of their own.
“Let me know if you can help. Thank you.
“Reading over this, it sounds like a scam………it’s not.”
Obadiah thinks this is a brilliant opportunity for the high-fee schools that claim to be Christian to think of others.
(“The myth of equality” was a brilliant book about inequality in schools put out by the Australian Union of Students, written by Tom Roper, later a cabinet minister in a Victorian Labor government. Maybe it is time for an updated version.)
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Another church “repurposed”: Commercial Real Estate reports, “Melbourne identity and industrial relations mediator Mick Gatto has snapped up the former St Marys Anglican church in Preston (pictured below).
“Gatto’s not-for-profit, Equal Access for Autism, which he runs with his wife Cheryl, is paying more than $4 million for the church and vicarage, built in 1922, on the corner of Plenty Road.”
The sad thing is that Obadiah could run a story like this each week.
Credit: commercialrealestate.com, supplied