It has been seen as a daring raid by crack Israeli troops to rescue dozens of their countrymen held at the mercy of hijackers.
But newly released documents contain a claim that the 1976 rescue of hostages, kidnapped on an Air France flight and held in Entebbe in Uganda, was not all it seemed.
A UK government file on the crisis, released from the National Archives, contains a claim that Israel itself was behind the hijacking.
“Contains a claim”, the weasel words so good they used them twice. Here is the claim as reported by the BBC:
An unnamed contact told a British diplomat in Paris that the Israeli Secret Service, the Shin Bet, and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) collaborated to seize the plane.
So if you get that far you discover that a junior diplomat chappie in, er, Paris, where they know all about events in Uganda and really know how to live, heard another chappie in Paris tell him that the Hand Of Israel was behind it all. The junior diplomat chappie then wrote it all down, writing down tedious gossip being what junior diplomat chappies are paid to do so that they can eventually become Ambassador to Belgium.
A little more info about the second chappie will be revealed later in this post, but even as it stands, this is pathetic. In its domestic reporting the BBC is painfully careful to avoid engendering prejudice, so careful in fact that it sometimes defeats its own object – but when Israel can be made to look bad it will grab any old mouldy leftovers from the back of the fridge and serve them up to its audience. The BBC is in no way excused by the fact it was not the only one. It is the only one I am compelled to pay for.
Hat tips to commenters Pounce and Ashley Pomeroy. The latter wrote,
“Inevitably this will be passed around the internet as the gospel truth, because it’s on the BBC. I can picture the arguments on Wikipedia in my head. “It is widely known that the Israelis faked the Entebbe crisis – even the BBC admits this” they will say.
Under the subheading “Ugandans killed” – not “Uganda soldiers killed”, just “Ugandans killed” – we learn that: “Two Israeli civilian hostages died in the shooting, and a third died later in a Nairobi hospital.”
The third hostage was an old woman who was strangled at the orders of Idi Amin, in revenge for his humiliation by the Israeli commandos. The report doesn’t say that. “A third died later” is incredibly misleading. It implies that the hostage was wounded in the shooting and expired of these wounds in hospital, whereas in reality she had been removed from the hostages before the rescue took place.”
Indeed. Dora Bloch, a 75 year old widow with dual British-Israeli nationality, was on her way to her son’s wedding when the plane was hijacked. The BBC has form on this use of “died” to mean “murdered while Jewish.” It played the same game when describing the murder of Leon Klinghoffer.
Now, about that second chappie, described as unnamed by the BBC.
The Times reported, but the BBC did not, that this mysterious person was “A contact Euro-Arab Parliamentary association”. The Times seems to have lost an “in the” at some point, but that’s nothing compared to the BBC losing a whole Euro-Arab Parliamentarian. Talk about Arab voices being silenced in the media, eh? Never mind, he did get a mention in Guardian, the Telegraph and the Jerusalem Post (Hat tip: Biodegradable for the JP) and practically every other outlet other than the BBC.
It would be nice to think that the BBC avoided mention of the Euro-Arab Parliamentary Association because unlike the sheep in the Guardian / Times / Telegraph all copying the same news agency report, the ever-diligent BBC had bothered to ascertain that there is no such body. There is a Parliamentary Association for Euro-Arab Cooperation. But I have a feeling that someone at the Beeb just didn’t think that an Arab (OK, OK, it could have been a Euro, only I don’t think even the Foreign Office wallahs see Luxembourgian rumours about the Israelis as worth recording) … where was I? Oh, yes, someone at the Beeb just didn’t think an Arab claiming that bad things done by Arabs were really the work of duplicitous Jews had news value.
The BBC story ends,
The file does not make it clear how seriously the government took the claim that Israel also may have aided the hijackers.
And, in the great tradition of Yellow Journalism everywhere, neither does the BBC.
BaggieJ:
So News International good?
Wasn’t offering any comment on the quality of the Times’ or News of the Screws’ pursuit of those stories, merely the fact that they were willing to pour big resources into investigating other media and they did it with a relish.
In fact, the Times’s assault was largely contradicted by an independent inquiry and the Screws ended up in a Mexican stand-off with the Cook Report and a meaningless settelement three inches from the libel courts.
But the Murdoch press’s full-blooded pursuit of other media was in stark contrast to JBH’s self-justifying whinge about the dangerously homogeneous and sheep-like the British media which hasn’t got the bottle to take up his story.
The answer is simpler. He does not have evidence to justify his assertions.
“But one day someone will broadcast my research. Maybe Israeli TV.”
No offence mate but I suspect Israeli TV has more pressing current affairs concerns than conspiracy theories (or even stone cold truths) about a relatively insignificant political spat in a foreign country over a decade ago. Or am I missing something?
Bryan | 06.06.07 – 10:33 am
John Reith et al could make a small start in the direction of transparency and accountability by taking an honest look at the exchanges on this site between David Gregory and yourself {Jonathan Boyd-Hunt}.
I have done so.
Let me clear a few things up, both about this exchange and JBH generally.
First: to the best of my knowledge I have never met David Gregory, nor have I spoken to him on the telephone, communicated with him by e-mail or in any way • whether in connection to JBH, this blog or any other matter. David Gregory is a Science & Technology correspondent based in Birmingham. I have never visited the BBC’s offices in Birmingham nor have I had cause to speak to anyone there in the past decade or more. I have not had any dealings with Gregory via any third party. I have not discussed David Gregory with anyone at the BBC.
The suspicion that you have expressed (and which you share with JBH) is that Gregory was steered off a meeting with JBH by me. That is untrue. In one of his initial exchanges with JBH David Gregory, in his post
David Gregory (BBC) | 24.05.07 – 11:35 pm
Writes as follows:
I’ve seen some of your longer posts and I’m just not sure I’ve ever seen that killer piece of evidence most journalists look for. Can I ask… why do you think no journalists (BBC or otherwise) have taken up your cause?
This tells me that though David Gregory posts seldom, he has been reading this blog for many months • probably at least since last autumn. He would therefore have seen the outcome of my attempts to take JBH up on his generous offer to make a charitable donation of £1000 if I could secure him a hearing from senior journalists.
You may remember that when I accepted JBH’s offer, I said that I would be travelling abroad for several weeks but would try to interest some appropriate journalists upon my return.
JBH then began to bombard this blog almost daily with jeering and sneering posts along the lines of “Reith • haven’t you found anyone yet to accept my offer yet?” – This despite the fact that I had already said that it would be 2-3 weeks before I would be in a position to even try. I imagine that JBH believed that on my travels I would not have access to the internet and would not witness his sly opportunism. He was wrong.
Despite his behaviour confirming his reputation for being slippery and dishonest, I persevered with the task of trying to get someone to examine his evidence. I found that people were reluctant to meet him because they feared that he would prove a troublesome pest • almost a stalker and/or they feared that if they examined his evidence and found it unsatisfactory, they’d then be lumped in with ‘the conspiracy’. I have since learned that this has been the reaction more or less throughout the world of journalism. That David Gregory should have come to the same conclusion is no great coincidence.
I now know full well why JBH has been given the bum’s rush by the media and will explain precisely why in a subsequent post.
Bryan | 06.06.07 – 10:33 am
John Reith et al could make a small start in the direction of transparency and accountability by taking an honest look at the exchanges on this site between David Gregory and yourself {Jonathan Boyd-Hunt}.
I have done so.
Let me clear a few things up, both about this exchange and JBH generally.
First: to the best of my knowledge I have never met David Gregory, nor have I spoken to him on the telephone, communicated with him by e-mail or in any way • whether in connection to JBH, this blog or any other matter. David Gregory is a Science & Technology correspondent based in Birmingham. I have never visited the BBC’s offices in Birmingham nor have I had cause to speak to anyone there in the past decade or more. I have not had any dealings with Gregory via any third party. I have not discussed David Gregory with anyone at the BBC.
The suspicion that you have expressed (and which you share with JBH) is that Gregory was steered off a meeting with JBH by me. That is untrue. In one of his initial exchanges with JBH David Gregory, in his post
David Gregory (BBC) | 24.05.07 – 11:35 pm
Writes as follows:
I’ve seen some of your longer posts and I’m just not sure I’ve ever seen that killer piece of evidence most journalists look for. Can I ask… why do you think no journalists (BBC or otherwise) have taken up your cause?
This tells me that though David Gregory posts seldom, he has been reading this blog for many months • probably at least since last autumn. He would therefore have seen the outcome of my attempts to take JBH up on his generous offer to make a charitable donation of £1000 if I could secure him a hearing from senior journalists.
You may remember that when I accepted JBH’s offer, I said that I would be travelling abroad for several weeks but would try to interest some appropriate journalists upon my return.
JBH then began to bombard this blog almost daily with jeering and sneering posts along the lines of “Reith • haven’t you found anyone yet to accept my offer yet?” – This despite the fact that I had already said that it would be 2-3 weeks before I would be in a position to even try. I imagine that JBH believed that on my travels I would not have access to the internet and would not witness his sly opportunism. He was wrong.
Despite his behaviour confirming his reputation for being slippery and dishonest, I persevered with the task of trying to get someone to examine his evidence. I found that people were reluctant to meet him because they feared that he would prove a troublesome pest • almost a stalker and/or they feared that if they examined his evidence and found it unsatisfactory, they’d then be lumped in with ‘the conspiracy’. I have since learned that this has been the reaction more or less throughout the world of journalism. That David Gregory should have come to the same conclusion is no great coincidence.
I now know full well why JBH has been given the bum’s rush by the media and will explain precisely why in a subsequent post.
…sorry about double posting.
Bryan:
Notice the failure to address the question.
John Reith:
Your scheming cleverness is matched only by your disingenuousness.
You say I’m dishonest? This is a new one! My, how desperate you must be! Is it the terrifying prospect that Bryan, or perhaps another contributor, might decide to study my work a little closer? And the BBC’s documented decade-long failure to report it too?
Back up the allegation or withdraw. And take up my offer to assess the merits of the evidence I’ve collated. Take up a wonderful opportunity to find flaws in my deductions, to prove I’m a fantasist and conspiracy-theorist, and by so doing utterly destroy my standing for all time.
You won’t because you know my work is sound. Instead you smear me with unjustified evidence-free attacks.
You’re a liar John Reith. A bad liar and a bad person. Truthful people are attracted to the truth. Liars avert their eyes from it.
You are, in fact, a very poor representative for the organisation you claim stands for honest, fair, inclusive, factual reporting.
JBH QC:
Truthful people are attracted to the truth. Liars avert their eyes from it.
Indeed. But you maintain that media refusal to entertain your theories is
merely a manifestation of tribal solidarity among journalists and news organisations, bolstered by the leftist bigotry that permeates the industry, coupled with dollops of self-interested reluctance to air a story by a couple of northern freelances, for crying out loud, that exposes like nothing else ever could just how dangerously homogeneous and sheep-like the British media really is.
The same media willing to take a hatchet to each other over Death On The Rock, the Cocaine Connection and Maggie’s Militant Tendency, to name but a few? (See above for longer list)
One other slight puzzle: Given your sensitivity that your northern freelance status might have put off the London media, why did you not work with the many experienced investigative teams still working at the time at YTV in Leeds, Granada in Manchester and Carlton in Nottingham? Or Channel 4, which is required to make a third of its programmes outside the M25?
Or the Liverpool Echo, Yorkshire Post and Northern Echo, all of which have substantial form publishing investigative work?
JBH
I have posted on the new open thread evidence of your integrity-light approach.
http://www.haloscan.com/comments/patrickcrozier/2399095767444739877/#358793
Murdoch’s arm of the MSM have the same globalising agenda as the BBC. They just come from a right-liberal viewpoint, the Beeb from a left-liberal viewpoint.
Just details really. Murdoch and his ilk want a McDonalds on every street corner, the Beeboids want us to be outnumbered with muslims and lovely 3rd world people. Eventually we end up with both. Great.
Murdoch and his ilk want a McDonalds on every street corner.
Lurker | 09.06.07 – 1:50 am |
What tosh … it’s Burger King.
I’m a little late jumping in on this one, but what you said above about Wikipedia was NOT an exaggeration. If you go to their discussion page on Entebbe, you will find that two people tried to put the rumors that the hijacking was set up by Israel.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Operation_Entebbe
There must have been a lot of back and forth on this one, because the page entry is now protected from changes.
Incidentally, great blog. I linked to you here:
http://shieldofachilles.blogspot.com/2007/06/bbc-news-biased-why-you-should-care.html