Language English Role Journalist Nationality American Education New York University | Alma mater New York University Notable awards Gerald Loeb Award Name Richard Behar | |
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Occupation Investigative journalist Books The Thriving Cult of Greed and Power | ||
New york observer s ken kurson forbes s richard behar honored at algemeiner summer benefit
Richard Behar is an American investigative journalist. Since 2012, he has been the Contributing Editor of Investigations for Forbes magazine. From 1982 to 2004, he wrote on the staffs of Forbes, Time and Fortune. Behar's work has also been featured on BBC, CNN, PBS, FoxNews.com and Fast Company magazine. He coordinates Project Klebnikov, a media alliance to probe the Moscow murder of Forbes editor Paul Klebnikov. He is writing a book about Bernard Madoff. Behar is editor of Mideast Dig.
Contents
- New york observer s ken kurson forbes s richard behar honored at algemeiner summer benefit
- Education and career
- Recognition
- Awards
- References
Education and career
Behar was born to a Jewish family in Manhattan and raised on Long Island. He is a 1982 graduate of New York University. Before joining Time in 1989, he was a reporter and associate editor for Forbes magazine for six years. He has also worked at The New York Times as a researcher and writer. Behar reported extensively about organized crime and the business backgrounds of politicians for Time, for whom Behar wrote a 1993 cover story on the World Trade Center bombing.
In 1991, he wrote "The Thriving Cult of Greed and Power", a Time cover story on Scientology. The acclaimed article won several awards. The Church of Scientology brought several lawsuits over the article, all of which were eventually dismissed. While investigating the story, he experienced some of Scientology's Fair Game tactics. He later learned that a copy of his personal credit report, containing detailed personal information, had been improperly obtained.
A 2003 report by Behar in Fortune explored Donald Rumsfeld's role in helping North Korea build its potential Nuclear weapon capacity, in an article entitled "Rummy’s North Korea Connection: What Did Donald Rumsfeld Know About ABB’s Deal to Build Nuclear Reactors There? And Why Won’t He Talk About It?" Behar is the only known journalist to have read the classified Phoenix Memo, the infamous pre-9/11 FBI document which warned the FBI about Osama bin Laden supporters enrolling in flight-training schools across the country. Reporting from Pakistan for Fortune magazine and CNN after 9-11, Behar’s “The Karachi Connection” broke ground by exposing a logistics leader of the 9-11 attacks—including his secret travels near the Afghanistan border just days before the terror attacks. A second article, "Kidnapped Nation" revealed how radical forces are undermining Pakistan's economy.
In October 2004, Behar left Time, Inc. to pursue book writing and various independent projects, including the launch of Project Klebnikov, a global media alliance investigating the July, 2004, murder of Paul Klebnikov, who was then the editor-in-chief of Forbes Russia. Behar also served on the advisory committee of New York University's business journalism Master's program (BER), and has long been reporting and writing a book about Bernard Madoff, to be published by Simon & Schuster. The book was initially purchased by Random House. In 2015, Behar co-wrote an article for the New York Observer that accused the Associated Press of improperly reporting civilian deaths in the 2015 Israel-Hamas war in Gaza.
In 2015, Behar and journalist Gary Weiss co-founded The Mideast Reporter, now known as Mideast Dig, a not-for-profit news site and investigative journalism project. Its aim is to deepen news coverage of the Middle East. Weiss left the venture in November 2015.
Recognition
Behar has won more than 20 major journalism awards and honors for his reporting. Behar was included among the 100 best business journalists (the "100 luminaries") of the 20th century by the TJFR business journalism trade group. In 1999, columnist Jack Anderson called Behar "one of the most dogged of our watchdogs."
Awards
Behar has won journalism awards, including:
- Gerald Loeb Award for distinguished business and financial journalism (1992)
- Conscience-in-Media Award from the American Society of Journalists and Authors (1992) "for singular commitment to the highest principles of journalism at notable personal cost"
- Worth Bingham Prize (1992)
- Cult Awareness Network's Leo J. Ryan Award