Friday's NBC Nightly News stood out for its coverage of the 100th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide, which began on April 24, 1915. Anchor Lester Holt gave a 27-second news brief on the "somber hundredth anniversary being marked around the world today – remembering what Pope Francis recently called the first genocide of the 20th century." ABC's World News Tonight and CBS Evening News both failed to cover the centenary of the mass murders. [video below]
Holt omitted two details from his coverage of the genocide. The anchor didn't mention President Obama has broken a campaign promise for seven straight years to use the term "genocide" to label the World War I-era massacre. Since the President's first inauguration in 2009, ABC, CBS, and NBC has covered the Armenian Genocide just four times previously on their morning and evening newscasts. By contrast, the Obama family's dog, Bo, has been mentioned 112 times on the networks' news programs.
The NBC journalist also failed to point out during his brief that at the time of the genocide, the Armenians were a Christian minority within the majority-Muslim Ottoman Empire. He merely identified the two ethnic groups involved in the historical event:
LESTER HOLT: A somber hundredth anniversary being marked around the world today – remembering what Pope Francis recently called the first genocide of the 20th century – the massacre of one and a half million Armenians by Ottoman Turks during World War One. Observances in Armenia; throughout Europe; the Middle East; and here at home, where tens of thousands marched through a Los Angeles neighborhood known as 'Little Armenia' to the Turkish consulate – waving flags and signs to make sure the world never forgets.
Jake Tapper spotlighted President Obama's broken campaign pledge in a Friday post/video on CNN.com:
This week is the 100th anniversary of what many historians acknowledge as the Armenian genocide -- the Turkish massacre of an estimated 1.5 million Armenians.
And it's also the seventh year in a row President Barack Obama has broken his promise to use the word "genocide" to describe the atrocity....
On the 2008 campaign trail, Obama promised to use the word "genocide" to describe the 1915 massacre by Turks of Armenians -- a pledge he made when seeking Armenian-American votes.
Back then, he held up his willingness to call it a "genocide" as an example of why he was the kind of truth-telling candidate the nation needed....
But that was then.
And now...Obama regards Turkey -- the only Muslim majority country in NATO -- as a more crucial ally than Armenia. Turkey has the second-largest military in NATO, behind only the U.S., and is a crucial ally when it comes to Syria, ISIS, Iran and other Middle East issues.
And Turkey denies this history....
