The Guardian newspaper's London offices. Photo: Derek Harper.

A few days ago, the Guardian made an egregious “error.” They used the word ‘terrorism’, in the Israeli-Palestinian context, without quotes. Here’s the relevant passage in the online edition of a story about the recent release of a second batch of Palestinian prisoners titled ‘Tension among Israelis after release of 26 Palestinian prisoners‘, October 30:

Of course, anyone who reads the Guardian would know that at least their unofficial editorial policy seems to forbid use such a value-laden term as “terrorist” to refer to Palestinian extremists who murder Israelis, at least without quotations or some other grammatical qualification. More typically, they use the word “militant” instead – even, as seen below, in this March 14, 2011, headline in reference to the Itamar massacre.

Sure enough, a mere day after their online “faux pas” about the freed Palestinians, the Guardian “corrected” their “blunder” in the print edition of the paper. In a shortened version of the October 30 story about the released prisoners, the quotes were wrapped safely around the potentially offending term.

Guardian print edition, Oct. 31.

Finally, we should note that the one seeming exception to the Guardian ‘no terror without quotes’ policy relates to stories about the murder of innocent civilians by violent extremists, which occurred on British soil.

Adam Levick is the managing editor of CiF Watch, an affiliate of the Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America (CAMERA)