Broadcaster Jim Clancy leaves CNN after ‘anti-Israel’ Twitter rant

Veteran US TV journalist Jim Clancy has abruptly left the international news broadcaster after 34 years, following a seemingly tangential Twitter argument over Charlie Hebdo that escalated to a verbal war between Clancy and pro-Israel social media users.

Although neither Clancy nor CNN revealed the reasons for the departure, almost all media outlets connected it with a somewhat incoherent Twitter spat that began in the wake of the fatal attacks on Charlie Hebdo, the satirical French magazine.

Clancy suggested that Charlie Hebdo aimed to poke fun not at the Prophet, but those who “distort his word”.

“The cartoons NEVER mocked the Prophet. They mocked how the COWARDS tried to distort his word. Pay attention,” tweeted Clancy on January 7 – from an account that has since been deleted – referring to the magazine’s editorial output.

What followed was a storm of criticism, led by an anonymous pro-Israeli blogger and Oren Kessler, a Jewish-American Middle East analyst among others. 

Clancy deleted the tweets in question and then his entire Twitter account, while CNN confirmed his resignation. By the end of last week, Clancy’s biography had been taken off the CNN website, and the journalist wrote a goodbye letter, saying “CNN has been a family to my own family,” and thanking it for providing “great adventures and achievements.”