The BBC favours stories that show Israel in a poor light, and holds back on the rest in a decidedly disproportionate manner. Because of events in Syria, Turkey now seems willing to resume normal relations with Israel. A UN report about the 2010 flotilla, which deemed the blockade of Gaza legal, and was generally favourable to Israel, passes by the BBC unnoticed, as do the somewhat bizarre attempts by both Israel and Turkey to modify the contents of the report, pre-release.
The BBC does mention another UN report, critical of Israel’s conduct during the war with Lebanon. UN special rapporteur Richard Falk blogs an antisemitic cartoon, which is ignored, yet Israel’s arrests of flytillistas at Ben Gurion airport are duly noted.
Which brings me to my final point. This fascinating interview with the irreplaceable Abba Eban shows that things have changed, yet somehow stayed the same. In 1958, nine years prior to the six day war, people in the media were already putting the case for Israel’s enemies, implanting and embedding the myths that remain to the present day, and showing that it is Israel’s very existence that her enemies object to and are resisting, aided and abetted by the Carolines, Rachels, Keiras and other BBC tweeters who display their half-baked 140 character ideas with such confidence and bravado. They have probably never even heard of Abba Eban, don’t know the first thing about the history of the Middle East, and are of a mind to overlook the peculiarities of the Islamic mindset and its inherent pathological hatred for Jews.
I hope these posts, which admittedly will swamp the site for a few minutes, will illustrate the ignorance, superficiality and agenda-driven half truths, which will be dished up for public consumption if ever the BBC monopoly comes to pass.
Myths and Facts Part 4
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I posted this on the general comments board but feel it has a place here:
How the bBC pulls the wool over your eyes over the so called plight of poor Palestinians in Gaza.
The bBC has run numerous articles this past month on how the nasty jews are withholding Aid to Gaza and that those very small ships that are currently berthed in Greece are the only means in which to get food to these people under siege. Well here is one story the bBC doesn’t want you to know about:
Palestinians take part in Championship Horse Jumping
I wonder how the British public would respond if this story of how the people of gaza are really suffering was aired at the bBC?
Gaza is not just broken slabs of concrete
Sue, keep on doing what you are doing. It will eventually eat away at the bbc and help to destroy it.
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Well done Sue!
Another great post, thanks very much.
The BBC spent a great deal of time and energy smearing Israel and twising the facts to blame Israel for the interception of the terror boat. The BBC laid it on thick, so thick in fact they would look pretty stupid allowing a UN report to see the light of day. As far as the BBC is concerened Israel is guilty case closed no need for evidence and no appeals and no debate.
I have a friend deeply involved with the Church (CofE) who does not see criticism of Israel as anti-Semitism. In response to me sending her the photos of the luxury shopping mall in Gaza used the words …’if they are genuine’. She then goes on say that of course all news reports are researched and only used if they prove genuine. She is obviously so indoctrinated by the BBC that she can no longer think for herself.
Criticism of Israel doesn’t have to be anti-Semitic. But clearly the form of certain criticisms inspires anti-Jewish sentiment, and is definitely used to excuse actual anti-Semitism. Particularly the kind of demonization often engaged in by the BBC.
Is she worth keeping as a friend?
How the bBC can’t see the woods for the trees when it comes to hating Israel.
Heated debate over Palestinian prisoners in Israel
The above link takes you an article about how hard Palestinians have it when it comes to living inside an Israeli prison. Why according to the bBC out of nearly 5 million Muslims the Jews have 5,335 of them locked up. Why the UK has more Muslims locked up(11,000) out of a figure of 3 million.
The irony here is while the bBC pushes out this vision of intolerable hardships inside Israeli prisons they include this snippet:
“Mr Abu al-Haj himself spent a total of 10 years in jail, beginning in 1978. He had commanded forces belonging to the Fatah faction that has long led the nationalist cause.He was illiterate when he was placed behind bars but took the chance to get an education. Eventually he gained a degree and wrote a book on the life of a prisoner.”We struggled just to get paper and pens,” he says, “but there are people who took the opportunity to build their personalities in jail.”
So let me get this straight, Abu who under Allah never learnt to read or write, not only managed to correct that lack of learning while locked up inside a Jewish jail (for being a terrorist) but he also managed to gain a degree and instead of using his head to work out that actually the jews can’t be that bad (Islamic jails are far,far worse) he complains he had to fight to get pen and paper. Yeah of course he did, he leaves out the teachers, the classrooms, the exams and of course the time to learn.
Lastly while the bBC promotes this vision of Israeli inhumanity they leave out one very salient fact about the Israeli Prison system. Alone out of all the countries in the region it does not have the death penalty.
Marvellous!
An Palestinian has trouble getting headed and scented notepaper in an Israeli prison and that makes the BBCs news?
In the interest of “balanced reporting” I await the story of any Jewish prisoner that they can find in an Iranian or a Saudi jail.
I imagine that getting the right shade of Parker pen would be the least of his problems-if of course there is a Jew alive in any prison that can be found!
About time that the BBC made some pretence of fairness isn`t it?
The above article claims that the UN report deemed the “blockade of Gaza legal, and was generally favourable to Israel” and then laments that the report has not been mentioned by the BBC.
Yet, this report, presumably referring to the investigation team appointed by the UN Sec-Gen and headed by Geoffrey Palmer, has yet to be released. Perhaps this is why the BBC has not yet reported it? Furthermore, the above article already pre-supposes that the findings will be “favourable” to Israel, yet the findings have not been publicly released.
Furthermore, the article ignores the fact that the UN Human Rights Council already released a seperate investigative report on into the flotilla raid and severely condemned Israel for its conduct. Amongst its findings were:
1) During the seizure of the Mavi Marmara, it asserts that Israelis used live fire from a helicopter to clear the top deck of resisting activists before any soldiers landed.
2) They find that the blockade “has to be considered illegal” because it is clearly “inflicting disproportionate damage on the civilian population” and “amounts to collective punishment” (citing for this, among others, the International Committee of the Red Cross, the guardians of the Geneva Convention).
3) It says that on board the Mavi Marmara “use of live fire was done in an extensive and arbitrary manner”, and that “the circumstances of the killing of at least six of the passengers were in a manner consistent with an extra-legal, arbitrary and summary execution.
4) The report concludes that “the conduct of the Israeli military and other personnel towards the flotilla passengers was not only disproportional to the occasion but demonstrated levels of totally unnecessary and incredible violence. It betrayed an unacceptable level of brutality.
http://www.crisisgroup.org/en/regions/europe/turkey-cyprus/Pope-Cyprus-The-UN-s-first-Mavi-Marmara-report-deserves-calm-reading.aspx
Aaah the UN human rights council eh? The one Israel rightly refused to have anything to do with on the grounds that it is a biased charade that had its guilty verdict written before any of the terrorist vermin aboard the ship were interviewed? You mean the utterly corrupted human rights council that incudes such beacons of human rights as Iran/Saudi Arabia/syria and all the most repressive regimes the planet has to offer. It has NO LEGAL standing to make any LEGAL judgements about anything. It can decide that the moon is made of cheese but it has NO JURISDICTION to make judgements on the legality of anything.
“1) During the seizure of the Mavi Marmara, it asserts that Israelis used live fire from a helicopter to clear the top deck of resisting activists before any soldiers landed.”
There is no evidence that IDF did any such thing, it is a complete fiction made up by those terrorist enablers on the deck and believed by the authors of the rigged report. Why would the IDF troops land on deck armed with paint ball guns and why were the first troops on deck beaten and stabbed unarmed?
“2) They find that the blockade “has to be considered illegal” because it is clearly “inflicting disproportionate damage on the civilian population” and “amounts to collective punishment” (citing for this, among others, the International Committee of the Red Cross, the guardians of the Geneva Convention). “
Note the terminolgy here “considered illegal” very different from using the word “illegal” they use the word “considered” because they cannot rightfully use the word ‘illegal’ because the authors know that the actions of the IDF were in fact completely LEGAL. The term “collective punishment” does not apply to a state protecting itself from a terrorist state, Gaza is a terrorist state trying to import the materials to wage a terrorist war of aggression against Israel and a blockade is completely legal.
“3) It says that on board the Mavi Marmara “use of live fire was done in an extensive and arbitrary manner”, and that “the circumstances of the killing of at least six of the passengers were in a manner consistent with an extra-legal, arbitrary and summary execution.”
Back to that again are we? Bit depserate to repeat this little chestnut I think. No person was killed until the IDF troops were attacked, stabbed, taken below to be held hostage. Under fire from from armed terrorists and fearing that troops were being taken hostage the IDF used lethal force as a last resort only. If there had been no violence from the terrorists aboard the Mavi Mara there would have been NO DEATHS, none of the other ships in the convoy had terrorists on board and there was no trouble on any other ship.
“4) The report concludes that “the conduct of the Israeli military and other personnel towards the flotilla passengers was not only disproportional to the occasion but demonstrated levels of totally unnecessary and incredible violence. It betrayed an unacceptable level of brutality.”
A rigged report with NO LEGAL standing isssued by a corrupted gang of anti semitic scum who come from nations that spit on human rights, they have no right to issue any moral judgements whatsoever. This ‘report’ has no more standing, accuracy or legal force than the ‘protocols of the elders of Zion’. It is nothing more than a racist slur and fabricated smear. An unacceptable use of force by the thugs and terrorists on the ship caused the deaths.
In fact the only UN report that matters, you know, the one with any claim on being legallly valid vindicates Israel, the actions of the IDF while being flawed were in no way illegal, in no way contradicted the actual real meaning of international law. There is only one group to blame for the violence and deaths aboard the Mavi Marmara, the terrorists and they are the violent thugs who put the lives of innocent passengers at risk by their criminal actions. The BBC is not going to advertise the real UN report because it has close links to the scum vermin who are to blame for the deaths of those terrorists that day. The UN human rights council is a groteque sick joke, its membership consisting of some of the planets most poisonous Jew hating hypocrites.
Yes, the Islamist-lefty alliance does all it can to muddy the fact that the commandos would never have abseiled one by one as they did from the helicopter if they had really fired first, stirring up a hornet’s nest.
That video of the “peace activists” beating the Israelis to the deck did wonders to support the Israeli point of view. Unfortunately for Israel’s enemies, there are a number of people who are not blinded by hatred of Israel and can work out for themselves what happened there.
Ram Rod, it’s not uncommon for journalists to comment on reports before they are officially released. Happens all the time. The BBC is most fond of Haaretz since it is a left to far-left paper and the BBC links to it frequently, at the expense of the more neutral Jerusalem Post.
The final wording of the report is extremely newsworthy since Israel-Turkey relations will be affected by it, whatever the result. But, as always, the BBC puts its loathing for Israel way ahead of the newsworthiness of any issue.
Uncharacteristically, there was nothing to bash Israel for in that Haaretz article and it even presents Israel in a good light for once. And so the BBC is not remotely interested in it
I pointed this out in an earlier open thread on the report that you refer to, Pounce. The case of the unfortunate girl whose Ukrainian born mother (married to an Arab and converted to Islam)vwas found guilty as an accessory to a suicide murder with her husband for driving two bombers (one of whom got cold feet and survived to give evidence) to the incident in which two were killed and over 40 wounded.
What I didn’t mention was that the mother was given the choice to return to the Ukraine to be with her daughters.
Mrs Sahrana refused.
Not only did she put her daughters into the position they find themselves in (used for propaganda even to the point of wilfully uncritical BBC coverage…ah, poor Palestinian girl) but prefers her hatred of Israel to her family.
A sad case of political obssession of the convert for the new identity.
Yet, the BBC happily shows a picture of a twelve year old girl as a victim of Israel.
It really is shameful and demonstrates the woeful state of the BBC coverage.
Thanks for this link Sue-as valid today as ever!
Despite the drooping ciggie and the plug for smoking, Mike Wallace is a far better interviewer than the BBCs attack shitzus.
The questions answers are the same today as much as ever-only the Chinese will pay more for the potash now!
In our diversity council beano yesterday all flags were surrounding the area on the bunting-except the Isralei one. Presumably the “Friends of the PLO” would have trashed it, so best not to include the Israel flag…provocative, just like being Jewish!
Noted too the lack of any figures about anti-Jewish attacks or incidents in the blurb that itemised every slavery story and every”travellers” woe that the Council could contrive!
Very dangerous all this-but luckily Israel won`t be needing the BBCs/Guardians permission to survive!
Note the Toynbee anti-Zionist nastiness…surely his daughters father. Polly even nastier and redundant!
United (Islamic) Nations…and freinds
“A UN report about the 2010 flotilla, which deemed the blockade of Gaza legal, and was generally favourable to Israel, passes by the BBC unnoticed…”
Not sure about that, sue. I think they saw it and THEN they let it pass them by.
The bBC, its hatred for Israel and yet another lie from its ace reporters.
Egypt: Gas pipeline to Israel and Jordan hit by blast
An Egyptian pipeline supplying gas to Israel and Jordan was hit by a strong explosion, state media and officials said… Egypt began supplying Israel with gas in 2008 under a 20-year deal, despite widespread public opposition because of Israel’s blockade of the Gaza Strip and claims that Israel was being offered preferential rates.
So the Gas pipeline between Egypt and Israel has been blown up yet again and the bBC promotes this view that it’s all down to Israel’s treatment Gaza. Really?
Nothing about how last Ramadan Egypt experienced power cuts due to the infrastructure not being able to cope with all the Air conditioning units and such which Egyptians now take for granted and when somebody in power is faced with protest in the Arab world whom do they always blame ,why Israel of course. I quote:
An Egyptian government official has blamed a natural gas deal with Israel for the country’s power cuts, the independent daily al-Shorouq reported Wednesday. The export agreement leaves less gas to run the local power plants, an unnamed official at the Ministry of Electricity was quoted as saying. The official argued that the decrease in gas provisions to power plants began in 2004, when Egypt started exporting gas to Israel.
Hang on, did the above report say that Eygpt first started supplying Israel with gas in 2004 before Gaza became independent, but the bBC says 2008 a year after Hamas took (by force) power. See how the bBC lies in which to demonise Israel.
The whole gas thing is complex. By blowing up the pipeline yet again, there is no doubt that Israel is inconvenienced but not critically because it has other sources. Arab Jordan is far more inconvenienced as not only is the percentage of electricity generation from gas much higher but the subsidized price it pays to Egypt is far lower.
The real victim is probably the battered Egyptian economy. About 68% of production is locally consumed. About 13% is exported. (CIA World Factbook) That suggests about 20% is stored and earns nothing. It also proves the complaint that Israel is depriving Egypt of natural gas is ludicrous.
Another factoid the BBC conveniently misses it that the gas deal stems from the Israelis returning the oilfields to Egypt as part of the peace treaty of 1980. Refusing to sell to Israel is a material breach of not just contractual obligations but of the peace treaty. As the peace treaty also included about $1.3 billion annually of American aid, its breach in such a material way would be a convenient excuse for the American to cease this subsidy.