It’s been the topic of speculation for quite some time but today more than ever before, news networks and press agencies are turning their heads towards blogs and independent news and media sites. Mondoweiss is a case example.

On Friday, June 1, Mondoweiss ran a report about Sandra Tamari’s latest experience in Israel. She had been detained at Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion Airport a week ago and was questioned for hours on end before being deported back to the United States. During the ordeal, interrogators demanded access to her personal email account. Tamari, a Palestinian-American Quaker and U.S. citizen, requested help from the U.S. Embassy but after being asked whether or not she was Jewish, Embassy chose not to assist her.

Mondoweiss followed up on the story the very next day with a personal account of two other American citizens who were also invasively interrogated. The narrative revealed that Israeli security forces demanded Najwa Doughman allow interrogators into her email account. The interrogates “sifted through [Doughman's] inbox . . . sarcastically reenacting and mocking old Google Chat conversations” and searching for keywords like “Israel”, “International Solidarity Movement”, and “West Bank”.

Doughman and her travel partner Sasha Al-Sarabi were deported back to the United States the following morning.

But the story doesn’t end there. Just days after Mondoweiss broke these stories, the Associated Press picked it up and repackaged it under the headline “Israel asks Arab visitors to open emails to search”. [Read more...]