In this BBC article, US marks seventh 9/11 anniversary, it says:
Mr Obama said in a statement “the terrorists responsible for 9/11 are still at large, and must be brought to justice,” in a reference to the hunt for Osama Bin Laden, who the US believes masterminded the attacks.
(Emphasis added.)
Damned if I can see any reason for that phrasing other than to cast doubt on whether it was Osama Bin Laden who masterminded the attacks. Wasn’t Bin Laden’s own video claiming responsibility good enough for the BBC?
We’ve had this despicable pandering to conspiracy theorists before. There was something of a flare-up a year ago today, as it happened. It ended with worldwide hostile interest courtesy of a link from the Drudge Report and condemnation of the BBC from a former head of the Joint Intelligence Committee and BBC governor. See this roundup post.
I’ll finish with some further observations from commenters. From “George R”:
In its report on 9/11 anniversary, the BBC presents the events of that day passively and anonymously:
“..four hijacked planes hit the Twin Towers, the Pentagon and a Pennsylvanian field.”
From “Pat”:
On today of all days a topic on the BBC HYS page is ‘Should the US review its war on terror?’
From “Martin”:
… I keep wanting to know where the ‘unsubscribe’ button is on the BBC’s website.
(Added later.) I do find it depressing to reflect how I came to write the above post. Before going to bed last night I scanned the BBC website and, remembering what happened last year, I thought, “At least they wouldn’t dare peddle that line agai– oh. They would.”
Finally, just to lay to rest any doubts: the title was intended as sarcasm.
UPDATE, 13 SEP: The wording of the BBC article has now been stealth-edited to “…in a reference to the hunt for the al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden.” The “Last Edited” field at the top of the page says “17:33 GMT, Thursday, 11 September 2008 18:33 UK”. This is untrue, as I noticed the original and offensive wording that prompted my post hours later than that and it was still there the following morning.
Can anyone spot the difference here?
“The new frontline in US ‘war on terror’ ”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/7607998.stm
And
“Displaced by Pakistan’s war on terror”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/7582576.stm
9/11 is an embarressment to the beeb…they can’t totaly ignore..so best just to cast doubt on its perpetrators…makes me ashamed to be British when i deal with my American friends and family.
In the BBC 2 ‘Newsnight’ presentation of ‘The War on Terror’ tonight, the BBC took a ‘politically neutral’ position between
– on the one side: al Qaeda, the Taleban and what BBC correspondents invariably describe as ‘militants’ (no use of the more accurate term ‘Islamic Jihadists’, lest some Muslims are offended),
– AND on the other side: Western forces of US, UK, NATO.
The BBC’s political reporting in all this is analogous to a 1942 Argentinian position, reporting the conflict between the two distant forces of the Allies and the Axis.
The BBC’s Mark Urban’s political position was not concealed when he went out of his way to cryptically, but disparagingly mention President Bush’s reference for the need for a ‘crusade’. I don’t know what Urban’s historical knowledge is about the Crusades; perhaps he should read about the predominantly defensive Christian crusades against expansionist Islam here:
[Extract]:
“Since September 11[2001] the crusades are news. When President Bush used the term ‘crusade’ as it is commonly used, to denote a grand enterprise with a moral dimension, the media pelted him for insensitivity to Muslims. (Nevermind that the media used the term in precisely the same way before the ‘gaff.’) Attempting to capitalize on this indignation, the leader of the Taliban, Mullah Omar, crowed ‘President Bush has told the truth that this is a crusade against Islam.’ Yet clearly the crusades were much on the minds of our enemies long before Bush brought them to their attention…
“Now put this down in your notebook, because it will be on the test: The crusades were in every way a defensive war. They were the West’s belated response to the Muslim conquest of fully two-thirds of the Christian world. While the Arabs were busy in the seventh through the tenth centuries winning an opulent and sophisticated empire, Europe was defending itself against outside invaders and then digging out from the mess they left behind. Only in the eleventh century were Europeans able to take much notice of the East. The event that led to the crusades was the Turkish conquest of most of Christian Asia Minor (modern Turkey). The Christian emperor in Constantinople, faced with the loss of half of his empire, appealed for help to the rude but energetic Europeans. He got it. More than he wanted, in fact.” (Prof. Thomas Madden).
http://www.trans4mind.com/counterpoint/madden.shtml
Considering it is 9/11, there have been a disgusting series of antiUS stuff on the TV and radio today. They are now stirring it with some stupid but obscure video game that involves attacking Muslims.
That ranked just one item below the report on midnight news of the US election.
Sick, sick,, sick
Some people are posting this item at LGF, apparently.
I hope it gets picked up as an LGF main item.
Are you fucking kidding me? We had a huge post and thread about this same thing last year. They had those exact words on their 9/11 page on CBBC’s Newsround.
There was enough of a fuss raised that Sinead Rock (or something like that) who was editor at the time was forced to apologize, and have them redo the whole thing.
It was even on Drudge for a moment.
I can’t believe they’re still doing this. I can’t ever get the search function to work on this blog, but somebody ought to dig it up and remind everyone here just how disgusting some people at the BBC really are.
With shit like this coming out of the mouths of Beeboids, it’s no wonder that there are generally two kinds of complainers whenever the BBC does an HYS about trusting the BBC: those who complain about bias like we do here, and truthers.
If this isn’t worth a special section a B-BBC book, I don’t know what is.
My apologies to all. I was obviously so upset by the BBC once again blowing a kiss at conspiracy theories about an act of mass murder which killed (among so many others) 30 people from my street, that I failed to read the rest of Natalie’s post.
David vance
You may want to alter the title of this post. Over the pond someone has referred to it as “BBC not sure who perpetrated 9/11”
Palin seems to have done in the first chunk of her interviews with the ABC network. Held her own, the focus was mostly foreign affairs.
The Dems are desperately hoping she will slip up.
http://caglecartoons.com/viewimage.asp?ID={740944C6-2BBC-45CB-89F7-A43E0D105E9A}
And I liked this cartoon – Sarah the Hurricane :
http://www.canada.com/montrealgazette/aislin/index.html?pubdate=9%2f4%2f2008
Politicians that care :
http://patriotroom.com/?p=1945
I was genuinely shocked when following a link called “Press mulls 9/11 legacy”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/7610180.stm
The press in question is not UK, American, or even worldwide but “newspaper columnists in Muslim countries”. Why is there no other opinion presented to balance this piece? Is playing the “Muslim victim” card appropriate on the anniversary of almost 3,000 killed in the US?
Whilst I agree it is important to examine Muslim opinion is the BBC giving us the full picture? Or just reporting what they would like the Muslims to be thinking?
Looking in more detail I found the English-language article for the BBC’s quote:
“It is impossible on this seventh anniversary to expect any improvements in the Western prosecution of the war against 9/11’s perpetrators. Why? Because even as the 9/11 American bloodlust fades, post-9/11 political stupidity does not.”
Out of context it appears to be a criticism of the USA. However, the “political stupidity” of both the West and the Muslim world is criticised after the BBC’s selected passage:
“there isn’t a credible Muslim voice in the world that is engaging in the discourse required to chart a new and better path in Afghanistan and Pakistan.”
And criticism of Muslim political leaders seems to be the main point as the article; as evident in the first and concluding paragraphs:
http://www.pkcolumnist.com/mosharraf-zaidi/911-and-the-muslims-crusade-english
Quite a different view from that presented by the BBC!
Remember! Remember! Remember!
We remember – the Panorama interview with the masked man who claimed to have murdered Airey Neeve
We remember – The misleading trailer of the Queen documentary
AND
MOST OF ALL WE REMEMBER THE DISGRACEFUL EDITION OF “QUESTION TIME” TRANSMITTED ON THE 12th SEPTEMBER 2001
REMEMBER!
Expat
That is a disgrceful and blatant distortion by the BBC – well tracked.
I am posting it on Justin Webb’s blog, warning US readers that the BBC distorts the news day in, day out – with an anti-American bias.
Richard Littlejohn:
“Singing la-la-la won’t make these jihadists go away”
[Extract, from Richard Littlejohn]:
“Whenever terror suspects are arrested here, the BBC floods the area with reporters anxious to reassure us that they are lovely mummy’s boys, who devote their lives to charity work and playing cricket.
“Sophisticates insist that the authorities are exaggerating the threat of terrorism for their own purposes.
“All we’re dealing with, they say, is a bunch of hapless fantasists, trying to make stink bombs out of pop bottles – Islam’s version of the Gang Who Couldn’t Shoot Straight.
“I wonder if they’d feel the same if they, or their loved ones, had been sitting next to one of these daft kids on the London Underground on July 7 three years ago.
“Even when Islamic preachers of hate in this country are caught bang to rights, there are always plenty of useful idiots to come charging to their defence.” (Littlejohn)
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1054788/RICHARD-LITTLEJOHN-Singing-la-la-la-wont-make-jihadists-away.html
The young lady with the Essex accent (yes I’m a snob about that kind of thing and about announcers with “regional” accents – but that’s another topic) reporting on the 9/11 events in the US on yesterday’s Radio 4 News at 8:00am told us that Americans are remembering people killed in the “collapse” of the WTC and the crash of an aeroplane in PA which was “apparently” due to passengers seeking to gain control of the plane: no mention (as I recall) that the WTC collapse was due to planes being flown into it, or the M word.
At its impartial best the BBC seeks to avoid offending “truthers” or its Muslim listeners: two groups which I guess have a considerable overlap and a sympathetic ear at the BBC.
Obama is an asshole plain and simple. There was an agreement that the 9/11 memorial would be politic-free and Obama broke the pledge by his stupid comment reminding everyone that Osama was still on the loose. That comment was a clear campaign message: “Bush has not got Bin Laden”. In other words Obama would have caught Bin laden by now.
Still Obama looked like an insensitive little fuck by throwing his flower at the memorial while McCain looked like a CIC by placing his gently on the memorial.
Says it all for me.
I’ve been away from the UK for twenty years now, I don’t have a UK address and I don’t vote. It occurs to me, however, that were I still living in the UK I would write to my MP or to any party leader to inform them that only a pledge to privatize the BBC is going to give them my vote.
Further to my comments yesterday on the BBC HYS page regarding the leading ‘Recommend’ being an American poster who made his views on Islamic terrorists very aggresively – he appears to have been removed. There is a trace of him in a response from Liberal left Bias, who of course does not agree (currently Page 1 of the Recommends).
P.S. Original American poster was Jeremy Mason of Houston.
Umbongo – agree. The so-called Essex accent is just lazy speech – I wouldn’t call it an accent at all. It’s generally confined to S Essex anyway.
So far as 9/11 is concerned, I can see this going down in the BBC’s version of history as a case of stupid, easily distracted American pilots who couldn’t fly straight.
“Next 9/11 in Britain, warn banned Muslim militants” (by Simon Kirby).
(‘Militants’?)
[Extract]:
“Members of a banned Muslim extremist group used the anniversary of the September 11 attacks to warn of more terrorist atrocities against the West.
“Leaders of the Al Muhajiroun sect said Osama bin Laden had taught the Americans a ‘lesson’ seven years ago, but the ‘crusaders’ had not learned and the next “9/11 will take place in Britain, the next 7/7 [London bombings] could take place locally”.
“Exiled cleric Sheikh Omar Bakri Mohammed addressed a 100-strong audience in Walthamstow last night via a video link from Lebanon.
“The radical preacher told supporters he believed the British government was trying to assassinate him and claimed to have foiled a bomb plot.
“Technical difficulties meant much of his speech was inaudible, but his appearance was greeted by cheers of ‘faith’ and ‘god is great’ at the community centre on Lea Bridge Road. Bakri’s right- hand man, Anjem Choudary, led the proceedings in person, under the auspices of a group called Association for Islamic Research.
“The most incendiary speech was delivered by Saiful Islam, who lauded Bin Laden and al Qaeda for their “courage” in retaliating against the ‘dictatorship and oppression’ of the West.”
http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/standard/article-23554769-details/Next+9+11+in+Britain+warn+banned+Muslim+militants/article.do
[Memo to BBC: pretend this is not happening.]
incredible
On 9/11 the so-called British Broadcasting Corporation’s Newsnight team of so-called journalists sneered their way through a so-called report on what they call the “so-called war on terror” and surpassed even their usual use of ‘so-called’.
Dictionary definition of ‘so-called’ : designated or styled by the name or word mentioned esp. (in the speaker’s opinion) incorrectly; – a so-called genius; these experts, so-called, are no help; often implying a doubtful or incorrect designation
9/11: from Walthamstow (see: 1:28 pm
above) to Brussels – neither reported by BBC:
“9/11 Remembered Verboten”
http://www.newenglishreview.org/blog_direct_link.cfm/blog_id/17015
“UK ‘on guard’ over terror – Brown”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7609873.stm
OR:
“Look here: Tragedy in Britain”
http://article.nationalreview.com/print/?q=ZWUzMzZiMzdhYWNlMGNlNjhlNzRlYjg3YmU2YTMwYzc=
In relation to this, Clive Davis has a hard time believing that so many doubt Al Qaeda was behind the attacks linking to this FT blog. Is it any wonder, though, when the state broadcaster says Osama is the man ‘the US believes’ was behind the attacks?
George R | 12.09.08 – 3:58 pm |
What kind of terror? Buddhist terror? Fundamental Christian terror? Martian terror?
Thanks JohnA! I’m not sure Justin will take any notice, but if some of his readers compare the BBC’s quote with the full article I’m sure they will see how the BBC has misrepresented this to fit their agenda. Next they will be claiming this “Muslin anger over the West’s foreign policy” is the only reason some have turned to terrorism!
Expat
I posted your link at Webb’s site, and told them that this distortion is standard practice by the BBC. They lie day in, day out.
I have only posted at Justin Webb’s site over the past couple of days, slagging off the BBC something rotten. They are going apoplectic, calling me racist etc. Which just makes me post even more. I am retired, have the time to spend on this, it lets me get rid of all the bile I feel towards the BBC.
There are some people on Webb’s blog site who are pretty neutral. I hope one or two of them are telling their friends that someone in London who seems to know quite a bit about the BBC says they are thoroughly biased and anti-American. Biased to the point of what they did yesterday.
What do you do in NY ? I haven’t been there for few years, I took one of my daughters about 6 months after 9/11. Not to be ghoulish, but just to show a little bit of solidarity. Guiliani had said that NYC was still open for business, that was they way to beat the bastards.
My daughter was very moved. I gave her a tour for a few days – including the Staten Island ferry of course, and Empire State Building – showing her where the Twin Towers had stood. She was most moved by a big cloth sign outside a fire station, just a bedsheet really, next to an Irish pub were went to. It simply listed all the men from that station who had died.
I was most moved by Ground Zero itself. I know NYC, and we were staying in a small budget hotel just off Wall Street. I could not sleep the first night, so I got up and walked round to where they had boarded the site off. I am not religious, but I did say a few prayers, just stood there thinking about it all.
Sod the BBC, I won’t ever forget what happened.
“”the terrorists responsible for 9/11 are still at large, and must be brought to justice,”
I suppose the terrorists being in the planes which struck the World Trade Towers has escaped Barrack Hussein Obama.
Hmmm, I wonder why they don’t re-run the infamous 9-11 “Question Time” featuring a bevy of Islamic harpies shrieking hysterically at the former US ambassador? It’s a historical artifact — are they ashamed of it or something?
Hi JohnA
I work for a bank out here. I was in London when 9/11 happened. I was working just off our dealing floor at the time and so we got all the news coverage as it happened. Some of our salespeople were on the phone with friends and customers in the world trade centre when the first plane hit. I feel there is a real connection between certain professions in London and New York; the very next day the London fire brigade were out collecting money for the 9/11 widows.
I came on holiday before my move to New York, I don’t think a visit to Ground Zero is ghoulish; although I was also a little uncertain about visiting it myself. Overall I found it very emotional; especially a timeline of events they had up. This brought back memories of the news on the day and strong feelings of empathy with all those involved. It’s great you came soon after, that’s just when they needed the support the most.
Over here I naturally follow the BBC website for news from “back home”, and this is when I started to become aware of the predictable views presented there. With the pervasive influence of the BBC in the UK. I guess you have to step away to see it sometimes; although if I had seen the infamous “Question Time” episode I may have realised sooner.
Keep on with your posting! The BBC was left alone to re-write history I can’t imagine how the UK would be in years to come. Just think about the CBBC Newsround’s 9/11 guide. If that wasn’t picked up by the commenters on this site it would still be there.
I complained and the BBC sent back an email saying they changed it “because it was clumsily written.”
Basically they simply replaced the statement with the following:”in a reference to the hunt for Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden.” They removed the “who the US believes masterminded the attacks.
So the Beeb’s mealy-mouthed non-apology apology is chalked up to “clumsiness” of phrasing instead of simply being in appropriately biased. They are truly lame.
Expat
I was working at Ericcson HQ in St James’ Square on London on the main work-room floor. There was group of Americans in the room, in Lodon for negotiations on a systems contract.
We were all utterly shocked, glued to the TV screens. But the Americans were hurt most, of course. I remember going to the toilet that evening, there was an Amrican crying his eyes out. All I could do, as an older guy, was hug him, try to comfort him.
JohnA:
I remember going to the toilet that evening, there was an Amrican crying his eyes out. All I could do, as an older guy, was hug him, try to comfort him.
JohnA | 14.09.08 – 12:30 am | #
Meanwhile, the worthless prat Damien Hirst was telling the BBC that he thought the attacks were a “work of art”…
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2002/sep/11/arts.september11
[remainder deleted]