Yesterday and today's digital edition of the New York Times featured an ad for some readers that could be labeled as Islamophobic. The ad also happened to coincide with the opening of the 9/11 Memorial Museum this week.
The spot went to the Investigative Project on Terrorism, a non-profit founded by Steven Emerson in 1995, focused on obtaining data on radical Islamic terror groups. While Emerson often earns the title of "terrorism expert" on news outlets like Fox and MSNBC, critics say he promotes racism and negative sentiments against Islam.
The ad reads: "Still here. Still free. But for how long?" Enlarging shows the full version below.
The group's press release notes that "radical" Islamist groups remain a threat today, but the ad lacks the same specificity. Islamist, however, refers to militant and fundamentalist Islam, not the religion in general.
Some, like Max Fisher of Vox, have interpreted the ad's sentiments as Islamaphobic.
Extremely surprised NYT would run a big homepage interstitial ad that is so openly Islamophobic. What the f*** guys? pic.twitter.com/hcKlpq0yJn
- Max Fisher (@Max_Fisher) May 22, 2014
Quite the ad on @nytimes homepage: "Stop Islamist groups from undermining America's security" pic.twitter.com/sLzPZuD4fI
- Eric Umansky (@ericuman) May 22, 2014
"This is the online version of an ad that ran on page A17 in yesterday's paper. The ad was reviewed internally and complies with our policy on advocacy ads," a Times Spokesperson told Digiday.
The New York Times' communications department did not immediately respond to our request for comment.