ByJennifer Lipman, Jennifer Lipman
The British-born editor of the well-respected Jerusalem Report magazine has resigned and blamed unreasonable budget demands and from the publication's management.
Matthew Kalman, who was appointed editor of the bi-weekly magazine in January, said that he had refused to implement a 10 per cent budget cut demanded by the management.
"I would rather resign than try to produce the magazine on even more of a shoestring than we currently have," he said.
When it began in 1990 the Report was an independent publication and one of very few English language news sources available in Israel. It was subsequently taken under the umbrella of the Jerusalem Post.
Mr Kalman, who has written for numerous media outlets including the Sunday Times and Newsweek, suggested on Twitter another reason for his departure. "I hope the Jerusalem Report can survive without a blog, Twitter feed, decent website or decent management, but I couldn't stay without them," he said.
In a recent blog post he referred to the challenge to the Report from "competition" from blogs and websites, including the Times of Israel news website, launched by former Report and Post editor David Horovitz this year and the freesheet Israel Hayom, which now offers a daily web round-up.
That crowded field is now set to become oven more so. Ronald Lauder, the billionaire president of the World Jewish Congress and chair of the cosmetics business, has unveiled plans to "establish a new website in English that would present Israel's position to Jews around the world".