If anyone still doubts that the BBC reports negatively and one-sidedly about Israel, do look at the comments (296 and counting) below the line at Nick Robinson’s article here.
The dubious standard of literacy and the appalling ignorance indicates that the commenters aren’t in the habit of seeking out details or background beyond their own armchair. In other words they’ve been relying on the BBC.
All they seem to know is that Israel has ‘nukes’ and Iran hasn’t, (so unfair) and anyway Israel is at the root of all the problems in the Middle East; and oh, Israel’s wars are none of our business.
It’s enough to make one weep.
Update. Quite a few pro-Israel commenters are fighting back! (356 and counting!)
Sometimes I have responded to the hostility towards Israel, accusations of genocide, Nazi state etc. Frequently my comments are moderated out. But Robinson’s article was about the middle east, which might allow scope for the Israel haters. Frequently any excuse to bash Israel is left in; whatever the topic, someone can find a place to bash Israel, or rather, Jews.
“I have learnt” – the key phrase in this article. Why and who would anyone reveal to Nick Robinson this kind of stuff?
Who? Well, only Government sources could have leaked this story.
Why? It’s a trial balloon, testing public opinion, laying out the options in a possible crisis and giving the opposition a chance to gather its arguments – almost signaling the Government’s distaste for any action they may be forced to take in support of Israel.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-18170328
Am I right?
If Israel and Iran come to blows is there one country in the world who will join the fight on Iran’s side? Surely not Sunni Muslims. Hezbullah might but they are effectively Iranian proxies, anyway. Syria might want to be really couldn’t.
The irony is that the best war to win this war without a shot fired would be for the world to announce their support for Israel, up front.
Some would say that the fact that the UN Security Council is putting a little pressure on Iran and that the IEAE is trying to get in there is actually tacit support for Israel. Others may even go further than that and claim it’s proof that the Jews are pulling the strings.
I’d just like to know how many people at the BBC see it as the former, and how many actually believe the latter.
I wonder how many people among those 296 have been to Israel or do they just rely on second-hand views. Come to think of it how many people on this site have been there? Have you David Vance?
I find that when people actually visit a country, talk to people, it tends to moderate their views — makes the haters less hateful, makes the diehard supporters rather less diehard. That seems like a good thing.
I think Israel is an incredible country that has achieved a huge amount in a very short space of time. It is a fantastic country, but it has its failings and we do it a disservice if we pretend otherwise.
Just my 2¢.
Who pretends that Israel is perfect? Do you have quotes from people here to that effect?
It was an observation not an accusation.
Eric: An observation of what, then? On what do you base your statement that “we” pretend that Israel has no failings?
If I can turn that around, I haven’t been to Israel, so my general admiration of them is second hand and based on the clear evidence of their achievements in agriculture, medcine , science etc.
I have lived and worked in half a dozen muslim countries and they have without exception been disfunctional societies. That, in my experience ,would be the view of virtually everyone from a western democracy who has visited them for any length of time.
The sheer dishonesty of the left and particularly the bbc, in refusing to acknowledge this fact , is politically driven criminality ! They are deliberately misleading viewers to promote their own agenda.
Interesting what gets past the moderators:
349. Shaunie Babes
I think Israel should be wiped of the map as it would save all the time and effort the Mods are putting into me not mentioning the “J” word in relation to its citizens.
Let’s hope that one was meant to be ironic.
Yet to be fair…
I heard a pretty facile interview with “both sides” today with Humphrys after 8am.
The Israel deputy Prime Minister certainly had much more time…granted his cause is correct, but had I been an Iranian apologist, I`d be complaining about BBC bias.
Just for a few moments I knew how a Guardianista feels all the time…
Yes, I heard that and I agree it was okay.
My point concerns the first couple of hundred comments on Nick R’s blog.
Which have now disappeared.
I can’t see any comments on that page. Is that the correct URL or are the comments not visible to people outwith the UK?
See above. Two updates on his blog seem to have replaced them. All three hundred and odd.
Does anyone know where disappeared comments go?
Down the memory hole. The worst thing about this pathetic act of censorship is that it’s mostly going to be proof of their views to those who believe the BBC is controlled by or at least heavily favors the Jews and Israel.
I can hear the cries now: See? The Mossad paid them to delete all those comments telling the truth about Israel.
The BBC likes to claim that they make such an enormous effort to broadcast in China and run a Chinese-language website to inform and educate the citizens of an oppressive regime which has no free press. Yet sometimes it seems as if it’s really the BBC who have learned a thing or two from the Chinese…..
Off topic but I have started reading a book set in Israel/Palestine. Although it has started quite well in terms of a potential story I am getting more and more irate with the author’s hatred towards Israel and Israelis.
The book is “Covenant” by Dean Crawford. His is a name to avoid for the future.
Some examples, for instance the only good Israeli is an oldish chap married to an attractive, intelligent, modern Palestinian. And he hates his government.
The author described Israel as (not an exact quote but near enough) a very large country. He obviously hasn’t got a clue. He seems to think that the Gaza Strip is still under occupation. He said that the people of Gaza have been persecuted for over a half century!!!!
This is an exact quote from a “Freedom Fighter” character: ‘Each year, Israel attacks our homes with tanks and fighter planes. They kill innocent men, women and children. They fire mortars at hospitals and United Nations buildings, and they shoot white-phosphorus rounds at fleeing Palestinians, burning them alive. They use remote-controlled drones to attack civilians hiding in buildings and then claim that they were being used as human shields.’ He then says about how all his family including baby sister were all targeted and killed.
There’s lots more of this sort of left-wing bilge. There’s also a group of rich, extremist Christians in the USA who believe in Creation and operate politicians. You know they will be supporters of Israel, and will happily kill for their crazy beliefs.
It’s prejudice and anti-semitism by numbers. This author sounds like a neo-nazi with this sort of anti-Jew hatred. I will finish the book but I will try and remember not to buy any more by him. Ugh!
And Anti-Christian too, don’t forget that.
There’s a lot of talk here about anti-Semitism and anti-Jew but what has any of that got to do with Israel?
As the BBC often says, it’s the Jewish Lobby.
Let’s hope that one (Albert’s) was also meant to be ironic.
Oh dear. I’m sorry to say it wasn’t. Albert the non-racist regards Israel as a criminal state
Israel regards itself as a criminal state, which is why Israelis have to be careful where they fly too.
Ariel Sharron is a war criminal as bad as any Nazi.
You don’t do logic, do you.
Your nonsense assertion that Israelis might be careful as to where they travel would be a recognition of how others might wrongly perceive them, not how they see themselves, but that assertion is BS anyway.
…and the nazi thing…really nasty.
To be honest Albert, your views would put youfar closer to the Nazis than any Israeli.
Israelis are not perfect, they’re human – which is something people like you won’t accept. I’ll give you a big clue here – Israel is much more a victim than a perpetrator. And no, of course Israel doesn’t regard tself as a criminal state. That is comfortably your most stupid statement yet.
You are clearly a victim of BBC brainwashing but are too stupid to realise. This is why Israel is such a big issue on this site – it’s one of the BBC’s nastiest smear campaigns of them all, and one of their most persistent.
I recieved a moderation email regarding a post i made on that blog….
Dear BBC Visitor,
Thank you for contributing to the BBC web site. Unfortunately we’ve had to remove the content below because it contravened one of our House Rules.
Your comment was considered to have broken the following House Rule:
“We reserve the right to fail comments which…
Are considered likely to disrupt, provoke, attack or offend others
Are racist, sexist, homophobic, sexually explicit, abusive or otherwise objectionable
Contain swear words or other language likely to offend”
For more information about the House Rule your comment broke, please visit –
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/moderation.shtml#f
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/moderation.shtml#g
You can read the House Rules in full here –
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/moderation.shtml#house
Please do not reply to this email. If you wish to appeal against a moderation decision, please visit –
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/moderation.shtml#canappeal
Please note that anyone who seriously or repeatedly breaks the House Rules may have action taken against their account without further warning.
URL of content (now removed):
http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/blog9/F23896852?thread=8353810&post=112602538#p112602538
Subject:
UK ponders nuclear tensions between Iran and Israel
Posting:
What ruins are underneath the Al-Aqsa Mosque? Who built them and who invaded and then destroyed a Jewish Temple and built the Dome of the rock on top of it? Judea – `Jew`dea … Jerusalem – `Jew`rusalem … Hmmm…. what am I getting at???? It`s not like I`m asking which came first the chicken or the egg!! If I asked what is two plus two would you answer three (becouse the Jews stole one?)
Apparently I am breaking thier house rules…. I have appealed and I will post what happens if they reply…
It looks like the BBC think you broke section 5 of the P.O.A. or their version of it.
Someone had a good idea the other day that the next time some BBC news reader say’s something you find offensive to call the police and demand their arrest and prosecution under section 5 and get a crime number.
If we all did it once I don’t think they would have anyone left to do the news. 😀
Agreed. Justin, your very first line violates the BBC house rules: it will provoke anger from the “you just don’t want to hear my legitimate criticism of the illegal, genocidal apartheid state, source of all the world’s troubles” crowd. Not to mention that pointing out such inconvenient facts offends a few BBC employees.
It would be cool to do but knowing our luck they would be too busy headlining the fooking Leveson Inquiry or reporting on the Olympic torch contributing to Global Warming as it passed from david Beckhams left hand to his fascist right…
P.S. Great site and great people…. Not at the BBC… But here!
How long does it take to moderate my comments here?
Justin, I think a new contrubutors first comment gets moderated, then after that they go straight up. (unless things have changed).
…or contributor even 😳
Thanks Reed 🙂
I have made a formal complaint regarding the moderation infraction…. I`m pretty new at this so forgive me if I`ve over egged it…. Here`s what I sent to them, I`ve yet to recieve a reply … Any pointers on how to put my case across to them in future would be appreciated… 🙂
I wish to appeal a moderation decision made against a post i made today
Link..: http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/blog9/F23896852?thread=8353810&post=112602538#p112602538
If the decision is upheld I want to know on what grounds?
My post was not racially insensitive. What I posted was historically verified factual evidence regarding the existence of the ruins of two Jewish Temples which are underneath the Al-Aqsa Mosque (Dome Of The Rock). The reason I posted subject matter regarding these 3000 year old ruins and the Western Wall was quite simply to put things into perspective due to the many unfounded, dishonest, bigoted viewpoints being posted on the thread by biassed and anti-semetic contributers. What I have said was 100% factual and proven historical and geographical truth. Also my metioning of the similarities of the word Jew and the place names Judea and Jerusalem was important in respect of a commonly accepted fact that these names did not happen to be just by chance. As for the last two sentences, they were added by myself purely to draw attention to the stupidity of some of the crass unsubstantiated remarks being made by your in-house blatantly Pro-Palestinian and unwarranted accusations being made regarding the rights of an Isreali citizen to exist in his traditional and historically proven homeland. Unless I am mistaken is it not true that the U.N. recognises the State of Isreal whilst the same cannot be said of the statehood of Palestine? This is not the first time I have been treated shabbily by BBC moderators. I am no longer able to post on your Facebook news groups either. On these same groups I have suffered many insensitive remarks and threats from other posters such as Jewish pig/dog etc. Nazi, BNP member EDL activist etc. Which I find most offensive as I have Northern Irish Catholic Parents. I have also had racially offensive messages and counter posts on many occasions regarding my Irish heritage and not once did anyone from your moderation team step in or remove these posts. As I said before this is not the first time I have been upset by your actions regarding my viewpoint that a conflict based on religion is an abhorration and should not be allowed my feelings are ignored. During the troubles my family has suffered religious ingnorance and injuries and also Deaths (The last being my Uncle John Moyne who was machine gunned by the UVF in the Greysteele Massacre as he bravely shielded his wife and a second cousin of mine) So it is not a case of me simply posted unfounded views simply to cause an issue… Sectarianism is an anathama to the world. Conflict based on religious bigotry and falsehoods is a blight on mankind. I am not a BNP member nor am I involved in the EDL (they wouldn`t accept me as I am the son of immigrants, immigrants who served in the armed forces for the UK!!! I am not a racist, I am a realist and a committed secularist who simply cannot stand idly by whilst an entire race is made a scapegoat for every single ill that has befallen the world since records began. May I point out that I intent to pursue this matter and this incident has been screencaptured and saved and backed up alongside your previous decisions regarding my postings. I intend to pass these on to my MEP and also to the relevent authorities whose job it is to investigate a breach of my Human Rights! You are meant to be impartial but your are not. You are meant to represent the cross spectrum of a multi cultural Britian, but you fail to take action when a person from the Irish ethnic background is besmirched threatened mistreated and then without hesitation silenced for giving a few home truths about the spurious comments and enabling of racist dishonest disgusting and sickening remarks on any of your interactive websites by your corporation at every given opportunity. I feel that my human rights have been breached and I intend to take the matter further should this not be resolved.
Although I still distrust them myself, I believe (according to their claims) that you would be made welcome in the EDL as they have Sikh, Jewish and Hindu sections. The only people they seem to dislike are Muslims.
Do you understand the definition of `secular`??? Also are you attempting to insinuate that I only have a problem with the Muslim faith?? If this is the case then let me help you understand that I have no interest in aligning myself with any group where it offers any enabling of religious sub groups within its` membership. Religion has no place in political domains. We do not need the threat of an imaginary diety and out of date laws anymore. We all know right from wrong thats what makes us human. Also Isreal is a Jewish State therefore a faith but at the same time a race. Islam is a religious doctrine… Not all Muslims are the same race. Indonesians are not Arab, Nor Iranians, Kurds, Turks, Somalians, Nigerians or Pakistanis. Please try not to make out I am some yobbish skinhead Muslim hater in future… It`s not cool. 🙁
You’ve totally misunderstood my post. I was not trying to make you out to be anything. As I said, I also don’t really trust the EDL but was replying to your comment that you wouldn’t be able to join it. Basically you can was all the point I was making.
I don’t quite see why you even think I was implying you were any of those things. I would think anybody like that would soon get short shrift on here as this site is not intended for haters, it’s for truth.
We even tolerate some haters like Albert above but as others have remarked it’s interesting to see how people like him think.
I apologise for anything I said that made you think I was accusing you of anything, but I can reassure you that was not the intention.
Well, I apologise for making a mistake… I`m so used to getting accused of being of the BNP or EDL ilk that sometimes I slip up… 🙂
The obliteration of any comments even happening strikes me as somewhat huge as a story in its own right.
Looking at RD’s quoted gem, that’s 349 (at least) licence fee payers (if a few rather psychotic ones) turned into non-people by the ‘we want your views’ BBC… because they can.
And.. no explanation?
I simply note this from Mr. ‘Update’ Robinson, hot on the heels of his recent ‘OK, now I have got back from hols and read what I blogged on in favour of Labour, and I still do’, and ‘Oi, Labour, this is what you should be telling us what to broadcast..’ games:
‘Labour has given its reaction to the discussions.
Shocked, I tell you… shocked!
At least such stories keep the cherry vulture infestations at bay… they seem to feel the bunker is safer to lurk in when such abuses are front and centre (left).
Please, keep sharing the progress of the complaints, as I’d love to hear what the ‘we’re comfy with disappearing all this like it didn’t happen’ brigade at BBC Complaints/ECU/Trust will weasel on this one, especially as there are at least 349 highly pissed-off witnesses whose testimony is but an FoI exclusion away in the now blanked BBC thread archive.
This goes beyond censorship to cover up.
Albert, comparing Ariel Sharron to a Nazi is just the type of hyperbolic rhetoric I see coming from left wing, Guardian reading, fair trade mocha sipping, BBC watching loons.
May I make a recomendation, put the Guardian down and have a walk along to your local library and get a book out on the 6 Day War, not the one by Jeremy Bowen that’s not a honest history book, but more left wing anti-Israel tripe and just more of the same thing you get in the Guardian and BBC.
Find out how Sharron made his name as a hard charging tank commander in the mould of Patton, and how Eygpt and Syria were about to launch an attack to wipe Israel off the map.
Not everything Israel does is good, but there 100% better than their neighbours, and to be fair you’d not exactly be all love and forgiveness to if you had to duck incoming rockets and mortars on your way to get your guardian, and mocha in the morning.
So please, Educate yourself, think for yourself read about a place if you can’t go, get all sides of the story and the main thing, stop letting people use you as a useful idiot.
The BBC knows about Iranian military chief Major General Hassan Farouzabadi. A search of the BBC website produces
five returns where Farouzabadi is quoted. So why no report about Farouzabadi’s latest outpouring?
Top Commander Reiterates Iran’s Commitment to Full Annihilation of Israel
‘So why no report’
Watertight oversight.
But fear not, they are hiring Albert as a researcher to ‘inform’ and ‘educate’ the ‘analysis’ of all, from Robinson to Bowen, so the UK public get a proper appreciation of how to think on what they are told about, and not worry on what need not concern them.
Talking of the BBC and Israel, and “the dubious standard of literacy,” I’ve just noticed this – apologies if it’s been mentioned on here before.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-18158122
I see the BBC acknowledged Israel in the headline, but the reporter didn’t get to that salient point until halfway down the article. The article is very badly constructed – if this was a school essay she’d have been told to invert the halves, so that the reader knows at once what the essence of the story is. Or at least she would have, in the days of grammar schools.
As it stands, this is a very poor standard of journalism on the part of the “national broadcaster”.
Of course, Israel is on the cutting edge of medical and scientific breakthroughs, few of which are ever reported by the Beeb. If they were, they would show the Jewish State’s amazing contributions to efforts beneficial to humankind. It’s hard to know whether these are sins of omission or commission on the Beeb’s part.
where is Jon from Norway????
😉
Recharging?
Is that Richard Black?
‘TV Licence Resistance Is Futile’
Last night’s broadcast of Nick Robinson’s ‘the Decision’ on Radio 4
ww.bbc.co.uk/radio/player/b01hxmx1
on how to deal with Iran’s nuclear project and Israel’s reaction to it is mainly worth listening to for Peter Jenkins sounding like a parody of an effete, drawling FCO Arabist straight out of central casting. At one point he says: “.. you’ll probably have understood, by now, that I don’t have a lot of time for what comes out of Israel.”
Luckily earlier it was noted by Robinson, that his thesis that Israel is playing up the Iran issue to distract attention from its illegal occupation of the west bank caused the others in the studio to shake their heads. I’m surprised they didn’t laugh when he described Iran as a defensive country that wasn’t attacking anybody.
Bronwen Maddox and James Steinberg brought a degree of sanity to the discussion – the former effectively disposed of the idea that Iran had no definite intention of producing nuclear weapons – but Robinson repeated the comparison with the Iraqi WMD fiasco once too often for my taste, while understating the amount of genocidal rhetoric coming out of Tehran. There was no mention of the post holocaust Israeli maxim that if somebody says they are going to kill you, the wisest policy is to believe them. There was no real talk about just how much of a friend of Israel Obama actually is.
It’s a pity, since they had Jenkins on, that they couldn’t have found somebody who argued for bombing Iranian facilities ASAP if not sooner, with the US and UK joining in.
Which country is constantly threatening to wipe the other off the map? I forget.
To get back to the main issue Diplomacy doesn’t always work – especially with dictatorial regimes dependent on outside villains to maintain their power. Appeasement didn’t work with the Axis it’s not likely to work with the Islamo-fascists either.
Liberals like to blame Israel because they feel they have some control over same and KNOW they have NO control whatsoever over Iran. With Libs it is ALL about control.