NYT disciplines editor after publishing cartoon depicting anti-Semitic tropes

The New York Times is disciplining the editor who chose to publish an anti-Semitic cartoon in Thursday’s international print edition, the paper reported Wednesday. 

The paper reported that it will also overhaul its bias training to have an emphasis on anti-Semitism, according to an internal note from the Times’s publisher, A.G. Sulzberger. According to the Times, it also will no longer run syndicated cartoons created by artists who are not tied to the paper directly.

{mosads}Sulzberger said the “offensive” cartoon was “downloaded and published by a single production editor working without adequate oversight.” 

“Though I’ve been assured there was no malice involved in this mistake, we fell far short of our standards and values in this case,” he added. 

The paper did not name the editor who oversaw the cartoon’s publishing and did not disclose what the editor’s discipline would entail.

The move follows sharp backlash for a political cartoon that included anti-Semitic tropes.

The New York Times Opinion section on Saturday apologized for the cartoon, which depicted President Trump wearing a yarmulke and dark glasses walking Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who was portrayed as a guide dog on a leash with a Star of David hanging from his collar. 

We apologize for the anti-Semitic cartoon we published. Here’s our statement. pic.twitter.com/nifZahutpO

— New York Times Opinion (@nytopinion) April 28, 2019

The cartoon was drawn by Portuguese cartoonist, António Moreira Antunes. Antunes told CNN in an interview conducted in Portuguese that he did not intend to be anti-Semitic, but blamed the accusations of anti-Semitism on what he called a “Jewish propaganda machine.”

“The Jewish right doesn’t want to be criticized, and therefore, when criticized they say ‘We are a persecuted people, we suffered a lot … this is anti-Semitism,’ ” he told the network. 

Antunes’s cartoon was originally published in Lisbon newspaper Expresso and was later picked up by the syndicate CartoonArts International. 

The Hill has reached out to the Times for comment.