CityNews Kitchener quietly deleted content from its website that featured a Canadian who had joined the Israeli military speaking about her service.
On May 20, I updated my Find IDF Soldiers website to add 78 more profiles of Canadians that have joined the Israeli military. Michelle Sigulim was one of the individuals I added.
Since then, nearly all of the public sources I linked to on Sigulim’s profile appear to have been removed from the internet, with the hyperlinks now leading to error pages. It is unclear who was responsible for removing these pages and why they were removed. I was also unable to contact Sigulim.
Two of the pages that have been removed were previously found on the CityNews Kitchener website. CityNews is a branch of Citytv, which is the television network owned by Rogers Sports & Media, a subsidiary of Rogers Communications.
The first of these pages, published on July 31, 2014, was an article about Sigulim titled “Former Israeli soldier speaks to 570 News about Israel-Hamas conflict.”
As I noted in Sigulim’s profile: “Sigulim was featured by CityNews because she was visiting Israel amidst its 2014 assault on Gaza. The publication stated, ‘She also says the Israeli military makes every effort to warn the Palestinians of impending rocket attacks by sending out flyers two days before an assault to “let civilians know that you’re in a dangerous area, there’s stockpiles of missiles there, there’s rocket-launchers in your area, and we need to take them out and they say ‘please evacuate the area for you own safety.’”’”
The second page contained a brief description of an appearance Sigulim made that day on a CityNews radio show: “Jewish girl that grew up in Canada, but when she turned 18, decided to join the IDF. She served for two years, before coming back to Canada to live permanently. She was recently in Israel for a family wedding, and at that time the war broke out between Israel and Hamas.”
I archived both pages before publishing Sigulim’s profile on my website.
I reached out to the CityNews Kitchener newsroom to ask: 1) why the pages were taken down; 2) who, if anyone, requested for them to be taken down; 3) if it is typical for the outlet to remove pages from its website without informing readers why it did so.
They did not respond.
The CityNews “news policy” contains a section on “correcting errors and updating stories.” It states: “On written request for removal or update of stories (e.g. concerning criminal charges), and upon receipt of sufficient documented proof of updates (e.g. court decision), Rogers will update a story published on company digital properties with the new information (e.g. charges were dropped). We will not unpublish a story or remove names. This policy is based on the premise that the original story was factually accurate and justifiable on legal grounds. If the original story was flawed and indefensible, it will be removed or a retraction posted, depending on the facts. Otherwise, an updated version of the story will be published, as written by the news team. The updated version will replace the original.”
The policy makes clear that the publication will only remove or retract stories if “the original story was flawed and indefensible.” It is not apparent if or why the brief description of Sigulim’s radio appearance and the accompanying news story were “flawed” or “indefensible.”
The Canadian Association of Journalists’ 2023 Ethics Guidelines states, “‘Unpublishing’ or removing digital content is sometimes used in exceptional cases where threat to public safety, legal restrictions, egregious error or undue stigmatization of a person may require extraordinary consideration. It is an extreme measure that should follow a defined resolution process.”
I have conducted occasional checks of the Find IDF Soldiers website to see if public sources I relied on have been removed. Some have, but this appears to be the only case thus far where a media outlet that operates independently of the subject it reported on has removed pages.
Davide Mastracci
