Author Archives: Ed Thomas

Two posts from the indefatiguable and Neverdocking Marc– one of which linked by LGF- highlight just what kind of an organisation the BBC are nowadays.

There is the extraordinary admission by Jim Muir that they were warned by Hezbolla that by showing Hezbolla firing from civilian sites they were endangering Lebanese lives and would have their equipment confiscated (oh the irony of such humanitarian concern!).

It’s extraordinary because in the first few sentences Jim Muir has said “There have basically been no restrictions on reporting as such – there’s been no pressure in any direction with regard to anything we actually say”

Note the “as such” bit, and the careful wording of “anything we actually say”. One wonders what the situation would have become like had the BBC actually said the things that their cameras weren’t allowed to show. In any case we live in a pictorial age. What people can’t see they don’t believe- and they believe sometimes far too much of what they’re shown.

If the BBC were not going to film Hezbolla firing from civilian centres (even some days delayed, for instance), how would the world know that the Israelis were often highly justified in hitting towns and villages? Well, as far as the British Broadcasting Corporation was concerned they wouldn’t.

The BBC with their Orla Guerinesque broadcasting (where they show selectively and comment disingenuously) have ensured that such shelling was seen in the worst possible light, reinforcing Hezbolla’s moritorium on showing their civilian warfare tactics by questioning the Israelis’ right to target such areas- when clearly they knew the shelling had good reason.

Marc’s other recent post illustrates just how the BBC is “onside” with the Hezbolla. I am not surprised to find a little boy thrust into the scene of a bombing to put it into a perspective negative to the Israelis. Many would say that ’twas ever thus in war areas and not to be naive. But there are two responses to this I can think of.

One is to say that the BBC, while clearly now playing up the Israeli bombing damage to Lebanon, have obviously played down the “pin-prick” Qassams and “maddening” Katyushas that have fallen on Israel.

Another is to say that when, as in the Blitz, poses were sought (I found this nice dramatic photo, for instance), it was our land, the British land, that was being bombed. If the BBC were Hezbolla TV then cute little boys beside big unpleasant unexploded Israeli bombs would be perfectly understandable.

Yet the BBC are the supposed neutrals in this. Now actually believing that would be naive. Today’s BBC “citizens of the world” choose with whom to identify on far more devious grounds than simple patriotism.

PS: Here’s David Vance’s take on the same BBC article that prompted Marc’s observation about BBC photo-staging. It begins, “Here’s an outrageous example of pure BBC bias”…

:

“They see no march

The BBC seems somehow to have missed thosuands of Muslims marching through London supporting terrorists and calling for the establishment of an Islamic Caliphate over much of the West. Strange. Can anyone out there think why they would not report on this particular item of news?”

Is he right? Can it be that the BBC have failed to notice this? Failed to report it? Failed the British public interest? Surely you can reassure me it isn’t so.

Thanks to Pounce (again) I notice that they did a little bit of background work on today’s little Islamic jamboree in Manchester.

Note how it was “Jewish concerns” they reported about the man Tamimi, when really the headline could have been ‘”Islamofascist” given platform by “moderate” muslims’. Well, if the cap fits…

This was a man who, captured on video in Trafalgar Square recently, called Israel a “cancer” that must be removed and likened it to a baby conceived by GWB and Tony Blair (!!historical memory lapse!!) which was destined for abortion, all to robotic chants of ‘Allahu Akhbar’. I’d say on the evidence it fits.

I’ve listened to it again and again, and Tamimi is quite clearly calling for the eradication of Israel, by violence if necessary- as he glorifies Hezbolla and Hamas and declares it only a “matter of time”. Says Tamimi, “you count my words, and you remember these words” . Well I have, and I shall, and suggest everyone out there, and especially anyone working for the BBC, does too.

Funny how the Beeb give all the best lines to the UNmeisters. Malloch-Brown gets away with saying gets to say that “something very ugly was brewing” in Darfur. Meanwhile the Beeb registers that the UN is “extraordinarily concerned”. Not sure where that rates on the scale of things. I guess that they’re more than just concerned, or very concerned. Their concern is beyond all such ordinary concerns. It is indeed most high and moral concern beyond all usual bounds. But what is the point of all this layer upon layer of concern except to reassure us that there are good people working on this and we can rest easy just as long as we pay our UN dues and subscribe to its authority? That’s the solution: once the UN pros have absolute power all things will be ameliorated. Yeah, right.

And the trouble is that it’s not where the news is, either. As Pounce pointed out, there are really two bits of news that prompted this wonderful outpouring of concern

1)The President of Sudan says he will welcome foreign peacekeepers the way Hezbullah opened their arms to receive the Israelis.

2)His army will fire on any intrepid do-gooder who tries to interfere while he’s brewing things up.

As Pounce concludes:

“Meanwhile the BBC news brings me on the minute reports from Lebanon on how the French are sailing warships on the horizon and how they are ready to deploy 50 soldiers.
Yup breaking news alright…….”

Please use this thread for off-topic, but preferably BBC related, comments. Please keep comments on other threads to the topic at hand. N.B. this is not an invitation for general off-topic comments – our aim is to maintain order and clarity on the topic-specific threads. This post will remain at or near the top of the blog. Please scroll down to find new topic-specific posts.

Orla Guerin’s truth.

“the more we walked, the worse it got… this town used to be home to 7000 people.”

Her report from the town of Bint Jbeil included an unmistakeable hint about prosecuting Israel for war crimes.

It’s a good job there are other sources. Drinking from Home has put her to shame, with the help of Channel Four’s Alex Thompson, who reported from the same town.

From Thompson we get the reality: “the centre of the town destroyed on a really wholesale scale, more so than since the last civilians left here, though it has to be said that on the outskirts, the suburbs – pretty much untouched by the Israeli attack and invasion.”

Hey, the outskirts, the suburbs- isn’t that where most people generally live? Yes indeed, Alex Thompson, it had to be said.

I agree with Ian Dale. The BBC Should Fire Orla Guerin.

(hat tip to Rog in the comments)

Please use this thread for off-topic, but preferably BBC related, comments. Please keep comments on other threads to the topic at hand. N.B. this is not an invitation for general off-topic comments – our aim is to maintain order and clarity on the topic-specific threads. This post will remain at or near the top of the blog. Please scroll down to find new topic-specific posts.

What does it say about the BBC that they have published a string of articles and photos in recognition of Fidel Castro’s 80th birthday, as well as a number of articles enquiring solicitously about his health? (I’ll be out by 100′ says Castro; Castro ‘will be back in weeks’ )

For one thing, it shows a naked admiration of power for its own sake. This article makes clear what is remarkable about Castro: “President Castro has outlasted no fewer than nine American presidents during his 47-year rule”

Ah, but BBC, this is not an achievement, it’s an indictment (as well as a compliment to the planned stable succession of US democracy).

According to Paul Reynolds, “He has cut a giant figure on the world stage during the 47 years he has controlled Cuba”

That’s right, all the world’s a stage etc. (much as I respect Paul Reynolds, I must say this is a duff note to strike, and that giving Castro a 50% rating in the balance of history will not do and is not objective). Why does the BBC need two articles, both venerating the dictator- one describing him as ‘the great survivor’, the other as a ‘world icon’?

Surely this is a root bias at the Beeb- for them the ideals of communism are rather romantic, the struggle of the Cold War the stuff of legend. For me, however, the Cold War is the great tragedy and its inciters great criminals.

If one cannot see that Castro is a bully with nothing to recommend him (if I don’t view him thus, I betray his many victims without a profile for history to view), how can one see objectively the more vibrant tyrants of today, ideologist heirs such as Chavez, Kim Jung Il and, more urgently, Ahmadinejad?

Answer: one can’t.

Perhaps the BBC would argue that there is nothing wrong in seeing good in Castro, where it exists. They repeatedly point to healthcare as his great achievement. I have heard otherwise, however (and, being objective, could one not suppose that a Cuba without the canker of communism and with a vibrant 21st century relationship with the USA would do much better for its people?).

From the blog I just linked, an apt quote with which to finish which shows how the BBC is even ahead of the liberal press pack around the world:

“Contrary to the media’s puerile awe at the 79-year-old Castro’s significance — he’s often reverently called “the longest-serving” Latin American ruler or “maverick leader” — he is one of the world’s most brutal, ruthless tyrants. And with popular democracy blossoming all over the world, pretending that Cuba’s an exception and Cuba’s people have no desire for freedom isn’t credible.”

At the BBC, not longest-serving or maverick, but “the great survivor” and a “giant figure”. Praise indeed.

See also: Tim Blair on the tyrant trail (via Instapundit)

(this is basically two posts compressed into one, since the contrast is instructive)

The Shadowy Network versus the Oppressed Community

Stephen Pollard has a post about the BBC’s stereotypically running to the old old story, blaming the influence of American Jews for the lack of a united international front against Israel (ie. in favour of a resolution favouring Hezbullah). The whole thing is laced with prejudice, but Stephen points out it’s also factually wrong.

meanwhile…

The BBC presents this whine festival of US muslim opinion concerning the US President’s use of ‘Islamic fascism’ as a term for the British-born Muslim terrorists of (mainly, with some tragic exceptions) Pakistani extraction who were caught plotting [ed] to destroy myriad flights from Britain to the US the other day.

Not only does this show how lightly the BBC takes the actual terrorism involved (and we know how lightly they take it- video), it undermines a valid and important use of language (and, having listened to and read transcripts of Bush a lot, his use of language is not stupid- he is just insensitive to the self-important press’s pc self-censorship, a kind of media illiteracy necessary to getting anything done). Update: thanks to Grimer, Bush statement video here– rather deliberate use of language I’d say.

No doubt if there had been a successful attack and Tony Blair had become all Churchillian, they’d have been giving the whine fest for British Muslims.

But, notwithstanding their ‘expert’ opinion and numerous Islamic mouthpieces, the term ‘Islamic fascists’ is really very straightforward: fascists who are Islamic. Like this fellow for example :

“At the Nuremberg Trials, Eichmann’s deputy Dieter Wisliceny (subsequently executed as a war criminal) testified:

The Mufti was one of the initiators of the systematic extermination of European Jewry and had been a collaborator and adviser of Eichmann and Himmler in the execution of this plan. … He was one of Eichmann’s best friends and had constantly incited him to accelerate the extermination measures. I heard him say, accompanied by Eichmann, he had visited incognito the gas chamber of Auschwitz.”

The belief in the “strong horse”, the inferiority of unbelievers (in the Nazi’s case non-aryans, but really non-believers in the Reich), the desire to exterminate the Jews and the veneration of conflict (jihad/kampf) are certainly reminiscent of nothing else but fascism.

When Bush used the term, my reaction was somewhat similar to Ian Dale’s:

“As soon as I heard him say it I smiled. Why? Because I knew the predictable handwringing outpourings of faux outrage we’d get from the liberal so-called intelligentsia.”

Cue Beeebies!

Bias oozes from the Beeb. Or maybe B-BBC commenters are just brilliant at noticing.

However, I have a couple of items I think from other blogs (including dear old DFH) which must have an airing here. Here’s the rigorous Richard North’s observations about the self-satisfied John Simpson’s easy going attitude to body-armour (one could extend this observation, but one would look uncharitable):

“had he been in Kiryat Shmona during a Hezbolla rocket attack, he would have been running for his life to the nearest shelter. But there you go… that’s discrimination for you”

I notice in the wake of the Qana controversy that EU Ref’s about to pass this blog’s hits recorded by Sitemeter- having experienced a remarkable spurt in traffic. Well, good on them for all the good work they’ve been doing.

And speaking of Qana, the BBC pronouncesthe photos ‘interesting’.

As I mentioned though, DFH has something he wanted to share with us: a powerful example of BBC news twisting as compared with other sources. Since when was a missile strike described as ‘crossfire’? The BBC’s flexible lexicon at work as usual? And, yes, Koffi where’s the outrage?

Please use this thread for off-topic, but preferably BBC related, comments. Please keep comments on other threads to the topic at hand. N.B. this is not an invitation for general off-topic comments – our aim is to maintain order and clarity on the topic-specific threads. This post will remain at or near the top of the blog. Please scroll down to find new topic-specific posts.