It’s time the BBC stopped immortalising the theory that settlement building is the obstacle to peace, or should I say to peace talks.
There’s a lot more to the settlement issue than meets the eye, and we should be given the complete picture. At present, not renewing the moratorium is viewed by most people as merely defiant and provocative on the part of Israel. So it has come to symbolise Israel’s perceived intransigence.
If Israel acquiesced to such demands, say, merely for the sake of occupying the moral high ground in the eyes of the world, the Palestinians would ratchet up the stakes and make more demands. Past experience taught them that.
What the BBC needs to explore are the tremendous obstacles to peace, not merely to peace talks, that are put up by the Palestinians. The insistence on the right of return, which would undermine the fundamental animus of Israel, a ‘right’ that is demanded by Palestinians alone. The hatred for Jews, instilled into the population literally from the cradle to the grave. Then there is the matter of their kamikaze attitude to life and death, which is an insurmountable obstacle.
“Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu offered to renew the freeze if the Palestinians recognised Israel as a Jewish state, but the Palestinian Authority dismissed the idea.” says the BBC, towards the end of the article.
I would have thought this deserved a little more prominence, and a little more analysis.
One thing the BBC is aware of. There is a disturbing development which might make the whole peace process irrelevant. South American countries are backing a unilateral declaration of independence by the Palestinians which would lead to a permanent state of conflict in the Middle East.
The BBC must start exploring, impartially, the whole story. Do we have to depend on Wiki to leak certain information? Must we be grateful for the revelations that several Arab leaders desire others to sort out Iran for them? With suspicions about such things confirmed, can people still defend Iran’s right to have nuclear weapons, and talk as though it’s merely Israel’s worry? Can people still talk about fighting Israel’s wars?
Let us have the full picture please BBC, then we can decide for ourselves where we want our loyalties to lie.
Its a game of who can build the fastest to create a reality on the ground, there is no Palestinian state with defined borders until a peace deal has been reached.
There was a peace deal with Egypt and the borders are now recognized and secure with both sides happpy with the deal, get the picture?
There has to be a peace accord between both parties for there to be a defined set of borders.
There was a series of wars of extermination against the Jews which the would be exterminators LOST. This makes any claim of victimhood by the agresssors ludicrous and yet the agressors have been able to persuade the international community that Israel the victim of armed agression should be sen as acting illegally.
This is akin to suggesting that Germany has a case for winning back the lands taken from it by force of arms. If the Arab agressor had not tried to destroy Israel then the pre 48 borders would exist in total, they do not because the Arabs dismissed their own legal claim by taking part in a war of agression to win lands by force of arms.
The Arabs did not take any notice of international law when they tried and failed to wipe Israel out did they? Now these whinging cowards bleat and moan about lost lands they themselves lost in an illegal war that they LOST.
Now the BBC knows all this, they know the history and they know the facts yet they choose to misrepresent the facts and withold others to make up a fabricated an unjustified case for Israel giving up lands it won in a series of defensive wars.
There is something rotten at the heart of the BBC when they freely choose to deceive the viewer in this way. Not once has the BBC allowed the viewer to see the truth, Israel would agree to a deal if the other side wanted a peace deal, they clearly do not.
Give it up with the Israel stuff, please!
The lefty BBC hates Israel and that will not change. Their coverage could be called into question if the Israeli’s actually had someone who knows a thing about PR.
Mark Regev is great but he is always defending stuff he should not need to.
Proud to be a gentile Zionist!
Funky,
Do stay on the line, your comments are important to us. Or they would be if we knew what they were about.
I could reply in the form of a mildly hostile & sarky Fisk, thus:
“Proud to be a gentile Zionist!”
Delighted to hear it.
“Mark Regev is great but he is always defending stuff he should not need to.”
Quite, but regrettably he does need to.
“The lefty BBC hates Israel and that will not change.”
What’s a defeatist like you doing in a place like this?
“Their coverage could be called into question if the Israeli’s actually had someone who knows a thing about PR.”
Yes, and my coverage could be called into question if teapots actually knew a thing about apostrophes.
“Give it up with the Israel stuff, please! “
After your reassuring declaration of support I’m considering it. If I do, at least I’ll be able to say “mission accomplished”. Our work is done!
Shall I tell Mark Regev, or will you?
Bit like Hillhunt on an off day- (Hi if you’re out there.)
On the other hand, I could a offer a straightforward expression of bafflement.
Why would a Zionist start by advising me (or us) to give it up with the Israel stuff?
Too strident? Boring? counter-productive? I guess I’ll never know.
***
Some interesting comments on Robin Shepherd’s blog re Argentina, the Falklands, discovery of oil, etc., etc.
And here’s a news story tucked way down on the (online) Guardian’s Middle east News page.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/dec/08/israel-to-allow-exports-gaza-strip
Good news, you would think – And pretty important..Even the Guardian reports it.
But the BBC?
You find it!
A state by definition must have a defined territory on which it exercises internal and external sovereignty, a permanent population, a government, independence from other states and powers, and the capacity to enter into relations with other sovereign states. Palestine fails on all of them.
Even assuming a wide ranging agreement could be reached tomorrow with Abbas and the PA which would bring peace, what happens with Gaza?
… another elephant in the room…
Jeremy Bowen says only ‘Some Israeli right-wingers disagree – but many others around the world and in the Middle East share the same view’ that ‘ending more than 100 years of conflict between Arabs and Jews would make it much easier to deal with the region’s other dangers’.
Like poverty, ignorance, racism, despotism and feuding, militant Muslim sects? One only can guess this because he never mentions them. Even before WikiLeaks demonstrated that the region is quite sensibly concerned with Iran over Israel, the Israel is the solution or even the precondition for improvement, was nonsense.
Essentially the whole article attacks Israel as the cause of peace failures.
He ‘balances’ it with one last BTW paragraph, guaranteeing that most will not read it. They have also to ask whether a deal is possible when the Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has a questionable mandate as leader and no control over Gaza.
Abbas has no mandate whatsoever legally. His term as President ran out some time ago and there’s no sign of new elections being held.
Anywhere else a President who overstays his term in office and fails to call elections would be called undemocratic at least.
But in BBC la-la-la land he’s a moderate and he really, really, wants peace…
JEWS NOT JAWS!!
The insanity that pervades the minds of Arabs and their useless idiots at the BBC when it comes to Israel is now evident in The Scotsman. Incredibly, the Jock rag is giving credence to suggestions from Muslim nutters that Mossad may have been responsible for the shark attacks at Sharm El Sheik!
http://www.honestreporting.co.uk/articles/critiques/new/Egyptian_Shark_Attack_Jews_Not_Jaws.asp
These lunatics are so whacked out they must have run out of tin foil hats by now.
The BBC never raises the question of why if Israeli settlement is so terrible the Palestinians don’t go to the negotiating table to make peace with the Israelis to end it. That is the normal, civilised, outcome of losing a war – one makes peace and concessions to the winner. Imagine if the Germans were still terrorising the Poles in a hopeless struggle to regain East Prussia?