Tory MP Daniel Kawczynski has criticised a Newsnight report on the war in Yemen, or rather it reports on the role Saudi Arabia plays in that war and the supply of arms to Saudi Arabia by the UK……never mind that the airstrikes by the Saudi led coalition are backed by the UN…the BBC implication is that Saudi is deliberately bombing civilians and that the UK is complicit in this ‘war crime’…
The airstrikes are backed by a resolution at the United Nations Security Council. But the UN’s top humanitarian official in Yemen, Johannes van der Klaauw, says attacks on civilian infrastructure are violations of the laws of war.
“Schools and hospitals, markets, enterprises and factories should not be stricken, should not be shelled. Even in warfare there are certain rules, and they are being violated in this conflict,” he said.
Since the conflict started, more than 2,000 civilians have been killed.
They quote a UN offcial but it is they who suggested to him that the Saudis were deliberately targeting civilians and asked him what he thought of that…so the UN official is not talking about facts just a bit of BBC whatifery passed off as truth.
Kawczynski suggested that the BBC’s coverage was biased against Saudi Arabia…
As far as I can see Kawczynski has a case, and Katz a case to answer. The BBC’s whole programme was set up to attack the Saudi’s role in the war and any British involvement in it. This was not journalism but propaganda…and it is no different to the BBC reaction to the war in Afghanistan and Iraq.
The war in Yemen was started by the Houthi who have ousted the legitimate president in a coup and tried to take over the country, it wasn’t started by the Saudis.
The BBC has always been anti-war, or rather, anti wars led by Western interests…and Saudi Arabia is closely linked to the hated US. Wars by doughty rebels of course are loudly applauded and cheerled….witness the BBC’s coverage of the IRA and the likes of Hamas.
Where is the BBC’s equally indepth coverage of Iran’s involvement in inciting and resourcing these wars? Iran has been a dangerous provocateur in the Middle East for a long time and has frequently provoked wars that seriously destabilise countries…it has supplied the Taliban in Afghanistan, it helped create chaos in Iraq and stoked the civil war, it essentially created Hezbollah and backs the attacks on Israel and of course it now backs Assad in Syria.
The BBC though makes little mention of Iran’s baleful influence on events and its attempts to inflame Shia Muslims inside Sunni countries. The BBC has always been somewhat pro-Iranian, often preferring to present it not as the aggressor but as a victim of the West…an excuse the BBC trundles out for everything really….blow up some trains in London and you’re a victim of racist oppression, kill Jews in a Paris supermarket and again you’re a victim of the West or its friends….so it’s OK to kill Jews if you are so oppressed!
The BBC’s excuse for not blaming the rebels and Iran?…
Houthi soldiers, some of them no more than teenagers, are accused of firing heavy weapons in built-up areas.
But it is the Saudis and their coalition partners, mainly Gulf Arab countries including the United Arab Emirates, who have overwhelming force.
So if you have the biggest army you must be guilty of something even if you didn’t start the war…sounds familiar…if you’re black you can’t be racist as you are ‘powerless’, if you’re a Palestinian you can’t be a murderous terrorist because the powerful Israelis have tanks and planes.
Sounds like the BBC is making up excuses in order to find a reason to peddle their own preferred anti-Saudi, anti- UK arms sales, narrative.
Kawczynski then gets invited onto Newsnight supposedly to allow him to voice his concerns….however it does look like this was just another set up to allow the BBC to attack him and defend itself rather than to do some serious journalism.
The BBC set their rabid attack dog James O’Brien onto him…now the BBC’s recruitment of O’Brien is visible evidence of its bias and intent. O’Brien hardly merits the title ‘journalist’, his preferred method of attack is to hype a trumped up, malicious charge against someone and when they deny it and prove it is false, to then claim the charge is therefore proven and the defendant a liar….half truths, complete lies and fabrications are the stock in trade for O’Brien. His infamous kangaroo court when he tried to smear Nigel Farage with a litany of falsehoods and nonsense was the thing that got him recruited to the BBC…as I said you have to raise questions about the BBC when it deliberately recruits someone who is so visibly prejudiced against UKIP and who clearly doesn’t let the facts stand in the way of a good character assassination.
His interview is arrogant, condescending and patronising. When Kawczynski raises the question as to why the BBC is not also investigating Houthi atrocities O’Brien brushes that aside and claims that Kawczynski is trying to control what the BBC reports…..when in fact all he is doing is to raise a legitimate concern about the BBC’s very evident lack of balanced reporting.
The editor of Newsnight, the Guardianista, Ian Katz, intervenes with a Tweet claiming that Kawczynski is only complaining about BBC bias because he is paid to act in the interests of Saudi Arabia….
Perhaps useful bit of context to tonight’s
#newsnight interview with@KawczynskiMP from MPs’ register of interests
Ian Katz 
Curiously Katz doesn’t mention that Tory MP Crispin Blunt, who backs the BBC, has taken money from Jordan, also a member of the Saudi led coalition in Yemen…..surely, on the basis that if you receive money from one country you must therefore be representing their interests, Blunt should also be supporting the war. Perhpas Jordan should ask for its money back…or Katz apologise for his deliberate libel.
He may have to apologise in court though…as Kawczynski suggests he may sue:
Mr Kawczynski told The Independent on Sunday, that he planned to write to the BBC’s director-general, Lord Hall, to demand an apology and a correction about Mr Katz’s tweet.
“What [Mr Katz] is deliberately suggesting is because I’ve accepted hospitality from Saudi Arabia, I’ve somehow been in their pockets, spouting what they want me to spout,” he said. “That’s a huge, deliberate attempt to smear me and others, rather than engage in the debate … I consider it a libellous tweet and I’m considering suing him.”
Katz isn’t of course always concerned with details or too up to date on Middle East politics, being a sleepy little fellow…
That tweet of Katz is a deliberate, innuendo laden smear of an elected MP.
Politicians of all flavours are invited abroad, at the expense of host Governments and have been for years and there is a requirement for ALL MP’s to declare such ‘hospitality’ in the register of Members’ interests. Kawczynski had a justifiable reason for being there with his MP colleagues – he’s the Chairman of the All Party Parliamentary Group for Saudi Arabia, FFS.
O’Brien’s sneering sarcastic interview was bad enough, that Katz can then go on to somehow justify it with that unacceptable tweet is even worse.
The hopeless, laissez faire Director General, Hall, needs to wake up, get his finger out of his arse and sort Newsnight out. The first thing that he should do on Monday morning is sack Katz.
The MP is demanding an apology – or he may sue.
It certainly looks like a deliberate smear. But if a legal case was won – or the BBC settled out of court – it is we who will pay.
Just one of many uniques
“Houthi soldiers, some of them no more than teenagers, are accused of firing heavy weapons in built-up areas”
All those GIs running around Vietnam with catapults could inflict a nasty bruise. Apparently. The BBC and teens and kids is but one more daft analogy they try and spin.
Whilst I admire Mr Kawczynski for sticking to his guns (perhaps not the best phrase to use!) in the interview, I wonder if perhaps he came across too strong. I realise of course it’s easy for me to comment from my armchair, but it might have been better if the MP had said something like ‘In answer to your question bla bla bla and perhaps in the interests of balance I could point out some inconsistencies in your coverage of xyz’ etc. We know that Beeboids tend to react very defensively if they are accused of bias. As it was, the interviewer was able to accuse Mr Kawczynski of evasion. Of course, it did have the effect of raising the whole issue of bias to an audience who perhaps had not even thought of it before, so in that sense it was well done.
I think he did the right thing. The interviewer was well out of order. Too many Conservatives limply accept the blatant bias and rude manner of BBC Interviewers. They need to strongly and even aggressively challenge their adversaries ( because that is what they are) on the BBC otherwise their confidence to continue their attack on the elected government of this country will persist.
I don’t know how to do it but pressure has to be maintained on Mr Cameron and his government to emasculate the bbc, including turning it into a subscription service, so that I can, if I choose to, watch free to view TV without paying a £145.50 penalty
Is it me?…or did Natalie Bennett really know more about geography that Jonathan Dimbleby?
Any Questions yesterday had-as its second question I think-something about Migration(really?…I hear you ask?)
Migration routes to be precise.
Anyway Bennett said that Syrian refugees would be classed as Middle Eastern-alongside those of Iraq and Afghanistan.
She had previously cited that Eritreans and the like were coming up from Africa…and North Africa was their launchpad-sorry place of reflection and sanctuary.
The Dimbly interrupted her to say that Syria was actually to be classed with North African ones…for it claims itself to be North African.
Now either I misheard( I`m not checking the crock of shite)…or Dimbleby(for all his private schooling and BBC freebies to wherever his Business Class Silver Service Card gets him on our tab) knows even less than the notoriously thick Bennett
…or the BBC have now rebundled the joys of Egypt and Syria into Nassers/Assads old UAR…er, didn`t turn out too well…
Dimbleby is one long brain fade in a linene suit-and think I should get round to Dimbly Doors asap to sell him my other old submarine propeller-and persuade him that it`s yet another wind turbine.
Either that-or a gay windmill for his disability scooter that should be on order for the old fool.
Poor sod-see what sucking up to royalty while being a lefty oaf all your life gets you?
That WITHOUT the passive dope inhalation too!
The problem I think with always going in with all guns blazing, as Mr Kawczynski did, is that it will just be dismissed as the ravings of a Tory, himself biased and probably compromised in some way. The comments, for example, in the Independent’s report of the interview, suggest this is how the left view it. When dealing with BBC bias directly with the BBC, I think it’s better to point out factual inconsistencies, bad reporting etc than simply accuse it of bias per se, because they’ll never admit it, but it’s much harder for them to defend sloppy reporting and bad journalism.
I don’t think your average Independent reader is ever going to agree the BBC is biased. They aren’t the ones that need to be convinced. It’s the Tories themselves and those who vote for them that need to be convinced. Once the BBC loses the support of that half of the electorate (and it’s gone a fair way to doing that already) it cannot claim to be impartial, no matter what the left half of the electorate says.
‘never mind that the airstrikes by the Saudi led coalition are backed by the UN…’
Yes, but the UN doesn’t support the bombing of civilians. Not a difficult concept Alan.
‘They quote a UN official but it is they who suggested to him that the Saudis were deliberately targeting civilians and asked him what he thought of that…so the UN official is not talking about facts just a bit of BBC whatifery passed off as truth.’
http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2015/05/strikes-yemen-saada-breach-international-law-150510001320162.html
‘”The indiscriminate bombing of populated areas, with or without prior warning, is in contravention of international humanitarian law,” Johannes van der Klaauw said in a statement on Saturday. “Many civilians are effectively trapped in Saada as they are unable to access transport because of the fuel shortage. The targeting of an entire governorate will put countless civilians at risk,” van der Klaauw said.
(The Saudi’s have announced that the capital, the city of Saada is now a legitimate target)
‘The BBC’s whole programme was set up to attack the Saudi’s role in the war and any British involvement in it. This was not journalism but propaganda’
The report (as explained by O’Brien), looked at evidence of war crimes by a UK backed Saudi led coalition in Yemen. This is absolutely a legitimate subject for an independent and impartial broadcaster to do. You should be praising that. Kawczynski simply repeatedly refused to answer legitimate questions and instead sought to shoot the messenger as a distraction. But he’s a Tory so you stick with your tribe right or wrong.
‘The war in Yemen was started by the Houthi who have ousted the legitimate president in a coup and tried to take over the country, it wasn’t started by the Saudis.’
Irrelevant. But Newsnight didn’t suggest otherwise. This hasn’t been the BBC’s only coverage of the conflict there. Coverage has included Iran’s role. It’s laughable to suggest the BBC ‘has always been somewhat pro-Iranian’.
‘The BBC’s excuse for not blaming the rebels and Iran?…Houthi soldiers, some of them no more than teenagers, are accused of firing heavy weapons in built-up areas.’.
Bizarre Alan. That sentence from the article has nothing to do with Iran. How are Houthi teens firing weapons in built up areas an excuse for not blaming Iran!?! Neither do I exactly feel sympathetic to a group which uses children to fire heavy weapons in built-up areas. That also seems to rather be in the face of the accusation that the BBC/Newsnight hasn’t mentioned Houthi war crimes doesn’t it?? But then coherent arguments have never been your strength.
‘So if you have the biggest army you must be guilty of something even if you didn’t start the war…sounds familiar…’
That’s not suggested or in any way implied. English comprehension is something I’d suggest you practice. It’d be helpful in your line of work.
‘it does look like this was just another set up to allow the BBC to attack him ‘
O’Brien asks ‘Do you think any investigation will occur?’ A simple and legitimate question, and one that Kawczynski repeatedly refused to answer. He asks again and again, and never got an answer. Kawczynski comes across as a complete fool. O’Brien responded to his criticisms of Newsnight fully and I think any fair-minded viewer would see Kawczynski for what he is.
I found it bizarre that he refers to the BBC sending Gabriel Gatehouse to some bottling factory in the middle of the desert at ‘the licence fee payer’s expense’. Imagine that….sending a journalist to report from a war zone. Down with that sort of thing!!
If you would attack the superb journalism of Gabriel Gatehouse and legitimate questions raised about the commission of war crimes, then you don’t deserve brave and independent journalism. Stick to your blog – graffiti with punctuation.
Thaddeus,
If you stand back and take the politics out of the equation, James O’Brien came across as a rude, aggressive, bullying, left-wing thug. His M.O. is a classic 1970’s union style approach – if you don’t agree with me I’ll try intimidation to persuade you to my point of view. That and childish sneering.
Really isn’t appropriate behaviour for the “world class, universally respected broadcaster” that is the BBC.
In the BBC’s eyes, James O’Brien is a hired gun who will take one for the team. If he screws up badly, he is expendable. He is no better on LBC. A real nasty piece of work indeed.
Thaddeus, you are either Mr Katz, Mr O’Brian or a BBC PR member of staff who has elicited this response from them. I hope you are sued because the sneering nasty tone of interview wasn’t clever, wasn’t informative and should have no place on a TV channel paid for by the British public.
Can`t agree Thaddeus.
Saw the clip on iPlayer, and if you don`t think there was an agenda, I`d be very surprised.
If we omit the abuse, red herrings and daft smearings, then I`ll say the following
1. it is NOT “irrelevant” how we got to here-my Yemeni politics is likely to be as ad-hoc and pasted together to suit my agenda as yours…but if a democratically-elected Government( to what standard, I can only imagine) is toppled by Houthi…and Saudi see a threat at their border?…than surely all that is VERY relevant.
2. O Brien asked the same thing, getting the same reply-the whole premise of the question was wrong, and did not follow what the MP said-just an agenda to back Gatehouses emotings…which, yes, will contain real truths and injustices-but without context like Saudi allies and UN backing being fairly weighted-will only give O`Brien a chance to bait a Tory.
And that name Kawcynski…you reckon he might KNOW something in the family about where efforts by thebien-pensant BBC to erect straw men might have led him and his family-you know, some time in the last 70 years or so?
And surely to Allah, you know the BBC/Lefts coverage of Iran since 1975 has chosen to enjoy the revolutionary footage and bluster-but turn its back on the original Arab Spring against Ahmadinejadh in 2009?
The Green Revolution only goes as far as paying for carrier bags as far as the BBC are concerned-fellow travellers only to the Red ones!
And calling Gatehouse a journalist is a bit odd?…could we not have sent Reggie Yates or Philip Schofield types , had we wanted a few tears and a moving video diary…journalism goes where the truth lies, not where the BBC expense accounts run out and the Houthi lead you to…that water bottle story was raised-and maybe Gatehouse ought to have explored the veracity of THAT…but like the dad of that Syrian toddler…some things won`t be getting checked by the BBC, because the truth is inconvenient to The Narrative.
I hate Saudi Arabia too, but the BBC need to give context, stop baiting Tories until they have put it all together properly( MacAlpine Fusiliers indeed)…why no Saudi Ambassador for example?
We pay for BBC lies, and agenda sifting…as Daniel said-it`s a bit more complex that O`Brien makes out.
Isn`t that the name of Big Brothers goon or such in 1984?
@ Thaddius
Stick to your blog – graffiti with punctuation.” You say.
You just can’t put an argument together politely. There just has to be denigration, scorn, abuse and sneering.
That interview was just plain nasty by an apparently very nasty man. I rarely watch BBC now and O’Brian types are the reason why. Also very sad to think you think this is, “brave and independent journalism”.
It’s a pity the BBC doesn’t try that aggressive interview technique on the friendly child rapists that still abound in our cities and towns. They are easy to find you know. Just a short walk from the Salford Palace of the BBC. Or better still get a local mini cab on the way to the kebab shop. But then that really would be dangerous wouldn’t it? Not quite as easy as shouting at a polite Conservative.
The idea of a journalist being “brave” is an insult to our military.
That interview demonstrates that shock-jocks entertaining themselves are the inverse of a professional interview.
I had the impression that O’Brian and the Newsnight team were having a good sneer at a ‘lying tory.’ Yet as Kawczynski was unable to answer a single question because of childish interruptions and scornful abuse we, the audience, will never know his views.
Newsnight should be put out of our misery.
Did anyone else notice that when they were talking over each other the Beebnazi’s voice was always louder. Two possible reasons, 1. The Tory was too polite to shout as loud as the nasty, sneering Beboid, or 2. His mic was turned up to 11 whilst the Tory’s was down to 8 or less.
However I would say that I, personally, would never normally back the Saudis at any time except against the Iranian monsters.
There is quite a thorough fisking of the Newsnight programme here, with the very apt title of “The BBC, a propaganda arm of Iran” –
http://www.thomaswictor.com/the-bbc-a-propaganda-arm-of-iran/