The following is an excerpt from OpinionJournal.com’s “Best of the Web” written by the editor, James Taranto.
Heck No, He Won’t Go
The Jerusalem Post reports that Unicef has not named retired soccer player Zinedine Zidane a “goodwill ambassador” to Gaza after all, contrary to a story we cited yesterday:
Zidane, The Last Word discovered, not only has no connection with UNICEF, but never made any commitment to visit Gaza or made any of the comments attributed to him.
The story was apparently complete fabrication which someone created and used to dupe thousands of people across the globe.
Also, in February London’s Guardian reported:
Marco Materazzi has received libel damages from the Sun newspaper over reports that he called Zinedine Zidane “the son of a terrorist [harlot]” before the Frenchman head-butted him in the 2006 World Cup final. The amount of the out-of-court settlement was not disclosed but was described as “substantial” and was reported elsewhere as being “a six-figure sum.”
The Internazionale defender had sued the British tabloid in the high court in London for wrongly reporting that Materazzi made the comment to Zidane–who is of Algerian descent–before the French player head-butted the Italian in the chest in extra-time.
Our item yesterday cited a 2006 article claiming that Materazzi had called Zidane a “terrorist,” a claim now probably best taken with a grain of salt. Other than that, though, our item was accurate!
For more “Best of the Web” click here and look for the “Best of the Web Today” link in the middle column below “Today’s Columnists.
