The Insufferable Hypocrisy (& Short Memory) of Murdoch's Australian

Here's the Australian's editorialist, lashing the ABC for allowing the clearly troubled, ill-informed and attention-seeking Zaky Mallah to strut his stuff on its Q&A program last Monday night:

"In allowing Mallah the floor, Q&A went far beyond its previous efforts allowing Julian Assange and David Hicks to question Julia Gillard and John Howard." (ABC's blunder of judgment, 24/6/15)

Now here's Martin Chulov, a former Middle East correspondent for the Australian, disclosing, in his 2006 book, Australian Jihad, that his paper threw money at Mallah. (The colleague mentioned was fellow journalist Louise Perry):

"Mallah hadn't told us outright the target of his proposed attack, but from the tone of his letter, ASIO looked a likely prospect. There was a stark conflict between our roles as journalists and our duties as citizens to disclose information we had about a planned offence, especially something as serious as a potential act of terrorism. Mallah had told us he would be in touch again shortly to arrange a screening of his [suicide] video... Within a few days, Mallah called again, inviting us to his home...

"'I've got the video now. You can have a look at it, if you want. How much do you think it would be worth?'

 "'I don't know, Zak. Why do you want to sell it, anyway?' I asked.

"'Islamicaly we have to clear our debts before we die. I need about $4000 to do that and then I'm sweet.'

"We had earlier arranged with The Australian to offer Mallah several hundred dollars for several of his jihadi photos. We knew the paper wasn't interested in buying his suicide video, but we decided not to refuse his request there and then." (Australian Jihad: The Battle Against Terrorism from Within & Without, p 173)