Hi everyone. Time for a new Open Thread to see us into the week. Please keep your comments on topic – BBC bias. Please keep your comments polite and do ensure that a  combination of civility, wit and perspicuity will ensure this remains THE premier site for detailing the appalling bias of the State Broadcaster. Clear? Off you go – the floor is yours!

The BBC isn’t interested in Muslims attacking stores selling Jewish goods, and Muslims don’t seem too interested in ISIS’ atrocities……and the BBC isn’t interested in that lack of interest.

“We will not stay silent!”

Whilst thousands protest about the Jews there seems a distinct lack of interest in genuine atrocities committed by Muslims…..

From Harry’s Place:

Yesterday’s anti-ISIS demonstration

About 400 people attended yesterday’s demonstration against ISIS in London.  The majority appeared to be Kurds and, although their anger and concern is fully understandable, it was a pity not to see more, and more varied, support.

Only 400 people when hundreds are being buried alive, heads hacked off, Christians crucified, non-Muslims executed in their thousands, women dragged off to be sex slaves, genocidal attempts to wipe out whole Peoples?

Yep, hardly worth getting out of bed for….however, the brutal apartheid state of Israel which is fighting the same people (yep…essentially the same) that are perpetrating the atrocities outlined above is worth demonising and it is worth making the effort to implement something not unlike the 1930’s Kristallnacht against Jews everywhere.

Good to see Muslim Labour MP Shabana Mahmood taking part in the anti-Israeli protests:

Curiously she has absolutely nothing to say about ISIS.

Her Twitter feed however is just one tweet after another about Gaza.

Love that ‘We will not stay silent’ in a retweet….

Have to say I always find it a little incongruous that Pakistani ‘Muslims’ leap so readily and passionately to the defence of ‘their’ religion…..to many Arabs Pakistanis, or any non-Arab Muslims, are second class Muslims….after all ‘Islam was revealed to the Arabs.’

India was conquered by the Muslims and those whose natural religion would have been Hinduism or Sikhism were mostly converted at the point of a sword. The thought might surface that to remain subservient to such an ideology, prostrating yourself five times a day in the direction of the Arab Mecca, might seem not unlike African slaves worshipping the Klu Klux Klan and wishing to remain slaves.

Many Arabs still regard the Pakistanis as vassals. They conquered them, therefore they are a lesser people. In her book, The Trouble with Islam, Irshad Manji tells how an Arab student let the cat out of the bag. She was giving a lecture in the USA when a group from the Muslim Students Association turned up to barrack her. She asked her audience why, if Islam is a ‘straight path’, there are differences its practice in the Middle-East from that in Pakistan:

‘Why the difference in practice?’ shouted a member of the MSA from the back of the room. ‘Because Pakistanis are not real Muslims. They’re converts. Islam was revealed to the Arabs.’

Why the media reaction to events matters when they whip up a storm:

Jayson Ross, who was leading the protesters toward the police before tear gas was fired, was quoted as saying by AP: “They got guns. We got guns. We are ready.”

Local politician Antonio French, who was with the protesters, tweeted to say: “Too many young men talking about they’re ready to die tonight.”

H/T  TPO in the comments:

Relevant audio at 6:17….

A Witness Conversation Unknowingly Captured at the Scene of the Ferguson Shooting is a Game-Changer

A previously unnoticed detail in a background conversion of a video taken minutes after the Ferguson shooting could change the course of the investigation into Mike Brown’s death.

The original video poster appears sympathetic to the narrative that Mike Brown was shot unarmed with his hands in the air. But he unknowingly picks up conversation between a man who saw the altercation and another neighbor.

An approximate transcription of the background conversation, as related by the “Conservative Treehouse” blog:

@6:28/6:29 of video

#1 How’d he get from there to there?

#2 Because he ran, the police was still in the truck – cause he was like over the truck

{crosstalk}

#2 But him and the police was both in the truck, then he ran – the police got out and ran after him

{crosstalk}

#2 Then the next thing I know he doubled back toward him cus – the police had his gun drawn already on him –

#1. Oh, the police got his gun

#2 The police kept dumpin on him, and I’m thinking the police kept missing – he like – be like – but he kept coming toward him

{crosstalk}

#2 Police fired shots – the next thing I know – the police was missing

#1 The Police?

#2 The Police shot him

#1 Police?

#2 The next thing I know … I’m thinking … the dude started running … (garbled something about “he took it from him”)

This is terribly important because if Mike Brown had been shot, and he advanced towards the cop instead of surrendering, it would substantiate the narrative that the policeman shot in self-defense due to the fact that he was being threatened with severe bodily harm.

This corroborates an account of the event given by a friend of Officer Darren Wilson:

Well, then Michael takes off and gets to be about 35 feet away. And, Darren’s first protocol is to pursue. So, he stands up and yells, “Freeze!” Michael and his friend turn around. And Michael taunts him… And then all the sudden he just started bumrushing him. He just started coming at him full speed. And, so he just started shooting. And, he just kept coming. And, so he really thinks he was on something.”

It’s far too unlikely that these two accounts are similar accidentally, having been from such disparate sources. The seeming witness in the background conversation is speaking with detail about the tragic shooting, and in a manner that runs contrary to the widespread version. Those who watch the video need to judge for themselves if the witness sounds reliable (but he would seemingly have nothing to gain by telling such a story.)

A third piece of the puzzle would be the toxicology report. If there happens to be anything found that might explain how Mike Brown might have been shot and kept advancing toward the officer, then the defense becomes even more believable. Unless someone is emotionally invested in an alternative narrative to the extent that one might ignore plain facts.

We shall see.

As many have noted in the comments the BBC, at least on the web,  has completely ignored the ransacking of a Tescos store by mostly Muslim ‘Asians’ in Birmingham….’a group of Asian men holding Palestinian flags came walking in and starting to push products over and getting aggressive with staff and shoppers.’

The BBC does however have this as their top story from Birmingham:

Thousands at Eid Mela celebration

Organisers say they thousands of people to attend Birmingham’s Eid Mela celebration.

• Muslim festival in park postponed

Perhaps these Tweets from other Muslims show why the BBC is reluctant to report his story……

Can only assume there is some reason anti-Israel protestors chose to start their march from outside BBC offices:

Tens of thousands of people took to the streets in Britain and in several other cities around the world yesterday to call for an end to Israeli military action in Gaza

According to police, more than 20,000 people marched from the BBC’s offices on Portland Place, via the US embassy to Hyde Park.

Here is some other context to the situation in Gaza that the BBC doesn’t highlight…..such as Fatah’s desire to keep the blockade, Fatah’s refusal to allow Gazans out of Gaza and the economic sanctions imposed by the US and Europe on Hamas:

From the Jerusalem Times 2010:

The Palestinian Authority is concerned about Turkey’s increased support for Hamas, a PA official in Ramallah said on Monday.

The official said that the PA leadership was “unhappy” with Turkey’s policy toward Hamas, especially with regard to pressure to lift the blockade on the Gaza Strip unconditionally.

The PA is also concerned the reopening of the Rafah border crossing to Sinai would enable Hamas to tighten its grip on the Strip.

“We wish to remind the Turkish and Egyptian governments that the border crossing was controlled by the Palestinian Authority before Hamas launched its coup in 2007,” the official added. “If the Rafah border crossing is going to be reopened, that should be done in coordination with us and not with Hamas.”

Azzam al-Ahmed, a top Fatah official in the West Bank, was quoted over the weekend as saying that he was opposed to the lifting of the blockade on the Gaza Strip until Hamas agreed to end the dispute with his faction.

Ahmed stressed that there was no humanitarian crisis in the Gaza Strip because the PA government was sending aid through Israeli border crossings.

Passports

Meanwhile, the Hamas government accused the PA of depriving residents of the Gaza Strip of passports. The government said the ban had been in effect since July 2008, effectively preventing tens of thousands of Palestinians from being able to travel abroad.

“The Fatah government in Ramallah does not care about the suffering of the people in the Gaza Strip, who are already under siege,” a spokesman for the Hamas-controlled Ministry of Interior said. “Every citizen is entitled to a passport, and no one has the right to deprive people of getting passports for whatever reason.”

Palestinian passports are normally printed in the West Bank. Hamas said the PA was refusing, for “security reasons,” to send thousands of passports to residents of the Gaza Strip who needed to travel.

According to the Hamas government, many Palestinian academics and “respected” figures have been denied passports by the PA government for the same reason.

 US sanctions:

Since the formation of the Hamas-led PA government on March 30, 2006, the United States has ceased providing both indirect and direct foreign aid to the Palestinians with the exception of some emergency humanitarian assistance. Following Hamas’s electoral victory in the January 2006 Palestinian Authority legislative elections, Administration officials and some Members of Congress warned the Hamas leadership that the United States would no longer provide assistance to a Hamas-led PA government unless Hamas changed its charter to recognize Israel’s right to exist and renounced the use of terrorist violence. On January 30, 2006, representatives of the Quartet (United States, Russia, United Nations, and European Union) conditioned future foreign assistance to the PA on the future government’s commitment to non violence, recognition of the state of Israel, and acceptance of previous agreements.

Updated to 2014:

U.S. Foreign Aid to the Palestinians

All of which shows that Israel is not alone in blockading and imposing sanctions upon Gaza….never forgetting that Egypt itself prefers to keep their border with Gaza shut as it does not like Hamas either.

So the ‘open prison’ as the BBC now like to call it, is not just a result of Israeli action, four years after Israel started the blockade Fatah stated that there was no humanitarian crisis as supplies were getting through, and Fatah blocked passports for Gazans to prevent them from travelling.

Here’s some context to the immigration ‘debate’…..what will uncontrolled immigration and an open borders policy bring us?  What indeed has it brought us?

If we’d been able to select who to let into this country perhaps such an attack would never have happened.

Politicians and the media who support mass immigration are to blame for such crimes.

The future…..a prediction from 2006:

2012 to 2018 is the period when the current global power structure is likely to crumble…Western civilisation faces a threat on a par with the collapse of the Roman Empire after the 5th century invasion of Rome by the Goths, the East Germanic tribe.

Adaptive adversaries will seek to utilise the media and the opponent’s political system to their advantage. States will increasingly sponsor proxies, seeking to exploit gaps in the international system while minimising state-on-state risks.

Thanks to ChrisH for reminding us of this 2006 prediction of what the future would bring us:

The DCDC Global Strategic Trends Programme 2007-2036

Here is the Daily Mail report:

Britain faces mass migration, warns Admiral

By SAM GREENHILL, Daily Mail

Last updated at 10:33 12 June 2006

Britain and Europe face being overrun by mass migration from the Third World within 30 years, a senior Royal Navy strategist claimed yesterday.

In an apocalyptic vision of security dangers, Rear Admiral Chris Parry forecast ‘reverse colonisation’, where migrants become more dominant than their hosts.

He said the seeds of the problem were spiralling population growth and environmental destruction.

In the competition for resources, many would flee their homelands and head en masse for better places such as Britain.

The Internet, cheap foreign travel and free international phone calls would hasten the demise, he said, because new migrants would stay connected with their homelands rather than assimilate into the host country’s culture.

His prognosis is that Western civilisation faces a threat on a par with the collapse of the Roman Empire after the 5th century invasion of Rome by the Goths, the East Germanic tribe.

And he said the process could start within ten years with African pirates attacking yachts and beaches in the Mediterranean.

Admiral Parry is head of the Ministry of Defence unit tasked with identifying future threats to Britain’s security.

He said: ‘Globalisation makes assimilation seem redundant and old-fashioned.

‘The process acts as a sort of reverse colonisation, where groups of people are self-contained, going back and forth between their countries, exploiting sophisticated networks and using instant communication on phones and the Internet.’

Admiral Parry, 52, an Oxford graduate who was mentioned in dispatches in the Falklands War, warned in a presentation last week that the world was heading for a cataclysmic security breakdown.

Although it would start in the Third World, the instability would seep into the West via the Mediterranean.

‘At some time in the next ten years it may not be safe to sail a yacht between Gibraltar and Malta,’ he warned.

He predicted that as flood, water shortages, agricultural decline or starvation strike, the most dangerous zones would be Africa, especially the northern half, and the Middle East and central Asia.

The flashpoints would also be regions affected by radical Islam.

With rural areas of Third World countries falling into ruin, millions would be forced into towns and cities, with the result that large metropolises such as Mexico City face becoming ungovernable.

In an effort to control population growth, some countries might be tempted to copy China’s ‘one child’ policy, but with the widespread preference for male children this would produce a ratio of boys to girls as much as 150 to 100.

‘When you combine the lower prospects for communal life with macho youth and economic deprivation you tend to get trouble, typified by gangs and organised criminal activity,’ he said.

He pinpointed 2012 to 2018 as the period when the current global power structure was likely to crumble, with the United States’s superpower status challenged by the rise of nations such as China, India, Brazil and Iran.

Admiral Parry, whose slogan was ‘old dog, new tricks’ when he commanded the attack ship HMS Fearless, delivered his vision in the presentation to senior officers at the Royal United Services Institute in London.

He did not claim all the threats would come true, but warned what was likely to happen if problems were not addressed by politicians.

Lord Boyce, a former Chief of Defence Staff, said of the analysis: ‘Bringing it together in this way shows we have some very serious challenges ahead.

‘The real problem is getting them taken seriously at the top of the Government.’

A later report continues the good news:

Ideological conflicts are likely to occur and extremist groups may use violence to achieve political objectives. There may be a resurgence of anti-capitalist ideologies, such as Marxism. Diaspora communities are likely to increase in size and influence and many will bring economic benefits to their host states. However, those that fail to integrate are likely to remain reservoirs for resentment. Some of these groups are likely to become involved in ideologically driven conflicts, and may act as proxies for other states.

The BBC’s coverage of immigration is simplistic and naive….it is shaped purely to present their own belief that immigration is beneficial to the UK in a positive light and seeks to downplay any problems that immigrants import with themselves.

Such simplistic coverage merely stores up enormous problems for the future….and that future is already here with terrorism, ‘Trojan Horses’ and crime.  It can only get worse as certain communities grow but do not integrate and continue to connect more with their own communities and cultures abroad than with the indigenous one.

Not to recognise these problems, sweeping them under the carpet so as not to upset that famous ‘community cohesion’ only serves to undermine that very cohesion by allowing communities to live completely separate, parallel lives whilst they seek to gain political and social power to influence events and policies to suit their own values and beliefs using human rights legislation, manipulating diversity law and exploit the Left’s multi-cultural, anti-white/British guilt complex to give themselves undue advantage.

The BBC and those politicians who opened the borders have a lot to answer for.

On Friday Dominic Laurie was talking to the Bishop of Baghdad about the ISIS crisis (12:42)

Laurie unwittingly revealed all that informs the BBC mindset when dealing with Islam and its sword waving followers……He stated that…

‘This isn’t though a battle between Christianity and hardcore Islam is it, because there are other areas of the Muslim faith, other peoples who are also Muslims, who are also being persecuted…it’s complicated…and it’s just as well really isn’t it?’

Yes…how wonderfully multi-cultural.

Laurie’s last comment gives the game away…it’s just as well other Muslims are being persecuted as well as Christians.…why is it ‘just as well’?…..because otherwise we might think ‘Islam’ had launched a war against all non-Muslims….and that would be difficult with 3 million Muslims in this country.

The problem for the BBC, and what they don’t really want to emphasise, is that those so called ‘other Muslims’ are not considered to be Muslim by the Sunnis.

There is no Muslim civil war between Sunni and Shia…..just Islam against non-Islam….the  Shia are not considered Muslim.

An uncomfortable truth, but a truth none the less.

What is happening in the Middle East right now is an echo from the past when 1400 years ago when Islam first swept across the world….it is history come to life in a full colour, bloody, action replay.

The Roman and Persian empires were exhausted and unable to withstand the small but violent attacks by Muhammed and his followers who quickly established their own dominance…just as an apathetic America and broken Arab states failed to stem the tide of ISIS…….and if you think the murderous violence of ISIS shouldn’t be compared to Muhammed’s rampaging conquests think again…Muhammed slaughtered all the men of the Banu Qurayza and enslaved their women and children just as ISIS did to the Yazidis.

Historian Tom Holland writes in the Sunday Times:

The ghastly images posted by ISIS on social media have shocked the world but to the perpetrators their act is a symbol of conquest practised for millenia across the Middle East – and one sanctioned by the Koran.

“We went to meet our enemies with small abilities and weak forces,”as one medieval scholar put it, “and God made us triumph and gave us possession of their lands.”

Now after a year in which they have routed forces many times their size, conquered a swathe of territory larger than Britain and grown flush with gold and oil, the fighters of the Islamic State can justifiably make the same boast.

Jonathan Freedland in the Guardian admits ISIS are a blast from the past…but in true Guardian fashion dodges the truth and tries to equate them with European Barons and not Muhammed:

The state structures of both Iraq and Syria have all but collapsed. The result is a power vacuum of a kind that would have been recognised in the lawless Europe of seven or eight centuries ago – and which IS has exploited with the ruthless discipline of those long ago baronial warlords who turned themselves into European princes.

The BBC tries to dodge that question completely, preferring instead, in true BBC fashion, to tell us how wonderful medieval Islam was and how horrible Christian Europe was:

Isis and what it means to be modern

When you see the leader of Isis, Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi, in Mosul announcing the creation of a caliphate – an Islamic state ruled by a religious leader – it’s easy to think that what you’re watching is a march back into the past.

There’s actually little in common between the horribly repressive regime it has established in parts of Iraq and Syria and the subtle Islamic states of mediaeval times, which in Spain, for example, exercised a degree of tolerance at a time when the rest of Europe was wracked by persecution.

 

Damian Thompson in the Spectator said:

‘This point can’t be stressed too often — our leaders know next to nothing about world religions, including those whose adherents have arrived on their doorstep. They’d better start learning, fast.’

Douglas Murray said:

The black flag of ISIS is flying in London

When historians look back on Europe in this era, they will rub their eyes in disbelief. ISIS is carrying out actual genocide, ethnic and religious cleansing on the people of Syria and Iraq. Their exact ideological soul-mates in Hamas, Hezbollah and al-Qaeda are doing everything they can to set light to the same region. Right now the western states are finally talking of intervening in Iraq to stop ISIS wiping out the ancient Yazidi and Christians communities of Iraq. Yet we do nothing to stop the same murderous ideology thriving here.

Instead another pattern is set. When we see this disgusting ideology at work, as we have done for the last month, much of Europe turns its hatred onto the Saturday people for defending themselves. Israel continues to defend itself. And we may do something to hold back ISIS in Iraq. But what will we do in our societies when we finally realise that behind the flag of Hamas is the black flag of jihad, and that after failing to stand up for the Saturday people there will be fewer people left to stand up for the Sunday people?

Most importantly, what will we do when we wake up to the fact that, far from being in some neighbouring or far-flung country, we have allowed the enemy to plant itself deep inside our own countries?

The BBC had better start learning fast about religion and stop thinking how wonderfully multi-cultural it is that ISIS are so diverse in their killing spree, not just Christians but ‘other Muslims’ too.

Because it isn’t true.  They kill those they consider non-Muslims.

And their ideology is no different to that spread far and wide by Saudi Arabia into many countries around the world, including Britain….funding Mosques, universities, schools and Islamic centres that are intended to spread the message and capture new devotees.

Just what have the BBC been getting up to with regard to the Cliff Richards story?

‘The BBC was plunged into a new crisis last night after it was publicly blasted by police over its role in the shock Sir Cliff Richard sex abuse investigation. In an extraordinary attack on the broadcaster’s standards, furious South Yorkshire Police accused the Corporation of breaking its own guidelines.

The force took the highly unusual step of announcing it had written an official letter of complaint to Director-General Lord Tony Hall over the Corporation’s controversial coverage of the case. The BBC caused a sensation with its coverage when the star’s Berkshire penthouse was searched for five hours last week.

The force revealed it had been contacted ‘weeks ago’ by a BBC reporter who had found out about their ongoing top-secret investigation into shock allegations that Sir Cliff had sexually assaulted a boy at a 1980s concert.  In an astonishing statement published late yesterday, police said they had been ‘reluctant’ to co-operate with the broadcaster but believed if they did not, the BBC would run the story anyway, potentially jeopardising the highly sensitive investigation.”

Now, someone is spinning here. Is it South Yorks, is it the BBC?

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2726859/BBC-crisis-Cliff-raid-Police-fury-TV-chiefs-screened-dramatic-swoop.html#ixzz3Ae0C0Hys
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I know we have had a few problems from a technical point of view on the threads. These have been worked on behind the scenes and so here is a new open thread that I hope runs smoothly.

Bored with the BBC’s ‘The Honourable Woman’ and looking for something more credible and inventive I settled for Jonathan Creek, episode 1 of the first series.

23 minutes in and we are given instructions on how to hack phone messages.

That was in 1997.

So why the outrage at Murdoch?

The War on Rupert Murdoch is the Real Story of the Hacking Saga.

If you read [Nick] Davies’ piece you are left with the impression that he – and perhaps his paper – hate two things above all: tabloid journalism and the influence wielded by Murdoch’s newspapers….the real scandal, at least according to The Guardian, is that Murdoch’s papers still exist and that, generally speaking and most of the time, they promulgate a right-of-centre view of the world and support the Conservative party.

Power. It’s always about power.

After all, consider this…of a possible 1600 names on a hacking ‘to do’ list….800 or so could have been hacked by the left wing Mirror….

The list of victims has been drawn up based on data from a PalmPilot digital device seized by police from Dan Evans, a former NoW and Sunday Mirror reporter.

Several sources have told the BBC the PalmPilot contained up to 800 names, while a separate list of names given to Evans by a senior NoW journalist contained a further 800 names.

The BBC understands around half of the 800 names on a contact list on the PalmPilot could have had their phones hacked while Evans was at the Sunday Mirror.

Where’s the ‘outrage’?

Free Alan Johnson   Gaza

H/T Is the BBC biased?:

DB on this site noted this from the FPA :

Foreign Press Association blasts Hamas for threatening journalists

The association said that several members of the foreign media in Gaza were harassed, threatened or questioned about stories they reported.

In addition, the FPA vehemently opposed “a ‘vetting’ procedure that would, in effect, allow for the blacklisting of specific journalists,” which Hamas is trying to put into place.

On Sunday, Paul T. Jørgensen of Norway’s TV2 reported that “several foreign journalists have been kicked out of Gaza because Hamas does not like what they wrote or said.

“We have received strict orders that if we record that Hamas fires rockets or that they shoot, we will face serious problems and be expelled from Gaza,” Jørgensen added.

Also Sunday, Hamas said it would require foreign journalists to provide information about Palestinian translators and fixers, as well as the address where they were staying, as part of a new procedure to receive a press card.

The new directives are aimed at “facilitating and organizing the mission of our foreign colleagues,” and Hamas warned that reporters who fail to comply will not be allowed to work in Gaza.

Harry’s Place has posted a video of Hamas confirming these claims:

“[T]he journalists who entered Gaza were fixated on the notion of peace and on the Israeli narrative.”

“So when they were conducting interviews, or when they went on location to report, they would focus on filming the places from where missiles were launched. Thus, they were collaborating with the occupation.  These journalists were deported from the Gaza Strip”

“The security people would go and have a chat with these people.  They would give them time to change their message one way or another……..[The Hamas line] The Israeli missiles do not discriminate between fighters, civilians and children. ”

 

Yes, think we have heard that narrative from the BBC…and yet no BBC journalist was coerced into voicing that message for Hamas?

The question we should ask is why the BBC doesn’t seem to need a guiding hand from Hamas to produce reports that have a particular bias?  Just what influences the BBC to produce such Hamas-friendly material even when not pressured to?  Even in their drama, ‘The Honourable Woman’ Hamas was invisible, the ‘bad’ Palestinians were from Fatah.

Perhaps we should ask just what was the deal that Mark Thompson did with Hamas to get Alan Johnson back in 2007?

Free at last

…. but at what price?

FREED BBC journalist Alan Johnston was back home last night – reunited with the family who had waited 114 agonising days for his release. His British Air­ways flight from Tel Aviv touched down at Heathrow at lunchtime and he flew on to Scotland yesterday afternoon.

But amid the rejoicing that sur­rounded the 45-year-old bachelor’s release, there were questions about the deal that won his freedom and the role played by the BBC.

A few weeks ago Hamas fanatics were tossing their rivals from the Fatah group from the tops of buildings in their ruthless pursuit of control of the Gaza strip.

Last week a jubilant Mr Johnston was a guest at the table of the Hamas leadership just hours after his release.

So far there has been silence from the BBC about visits made to Gaza by its director-general Mark Thompson during the kidnapping.

It is believed he was meeting senior Hamas officials with the aim of securing the release of one of his staff.

A few weeks ago the Sunday Express was informed that the BBC was taking advice on how to handle the crisis from a London-based private security firm which employs former members of the special forces. We were told that the corporation was considering paying a ransom of about £2million for the return of their man, a claim strenuously denied by senior executives at the time.

The Sunday Express did not run the story for fear of damaging the delicate negotiations going on behind the scenes in London and Gaza.

It is being claimed that Hamas has benefited greatly from Mr Johnston’s release and there has been a trade-off.