Category Archives: Palestinians

From the comments David Preiser writes:

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“I couldn’t help noticing the ridiculous BBC online coverage of the idiotic global warming protest camp at Heathrow over the weekend. The BBC’s coverage sure seemed to me like a veritable propaganda newsletter, complete with maps.”

Ah, but he was not the only one.

Donal Blaney writes on his blog:

“With fawning excitement, the BBC has paid excessive attention to the sordid collection of hippies, pot smokers and anarchists who are protesting at Heathrow Airport against freedom of movement of our citizenry.”

Meanwhile the excellent Weasel writes (with highlighted quotes) about one of the early articles during the protest:

“This is such propagandist, sandal wearing tosh, it is hard to know how to begin, but it is yet another clear demonstration that the BBC has lost all pretense of being neutral about certain issues, the environment being one of their little pets”

But David, in his comment, alludes to a darker side to the protests, and sure enough he is right to- Green Activists Attack Jewish Warehouse- Hoist Palestinian Flag!.

I don’t know what pro-Palestinian gestures and anti-Israeli violence have to do with green issues, but there seems to be something in the mind of protesters that there is such a connection.

It seems to me there is something though which might explain both the BBC’s reticence concerning reporting negative news concerning them, and their positiveness concerning the protests generally.

There is a strong sense in the BBC that such protests are righteous, falling into a long and in their eyes noble tradition of “progressive” protest, and the Beeb throws its moral weight behind them.

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The moral murk

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From the pathetic (see below post) to the poignant. Joseph Loconte notes the frenzied way in which the BBC is campaigning for the release of its journalist Alan Johnston.

Naturally one feels a little of their desperation; we’ve seen far too many atrocities and needless deaths over recent years in the name of Islam and the Palestinians.

Quite whether almost daily Johnston-centred updates, pleas and reports from the BBC is a good use of telly-taxpayers money is a question almost indecent to mention, yet inevitable because the BBC is a state-sponsored organisation. One wouldn’t wish to be brought into it, but where one’s wallet is compelled, one is drawn afterwards.

There is also the question of the BBC’s closeness to Government, as HMG seeks to draw near and reason with Abu Qatada, a radical (terror enabler) believed to have close links to Al Qaeda, believed to have influence in the group holding Johnston. To what extent the BBC is using its influence to manoeuvre the Foreign Office- which funds the BBC world service – is as unclear as ever.

Loconte zeroes in on the words of Mark Thompson, BBC DG:

“Alan…is a brave, dedicated and humane journalist who was deeply committed to reporting events in Gaza to the wider world,”…“The people of Gaza are ill-served by kidnappings of this nature.” (highlight mine)

Loconte points out the strangeness of saying “kidnappings of this nature”, which implies that some kidnappings might be justified. Certainly such a distinction is in keeping with BBC moral equivocations over terrorism. Sometimes it is, sometimes it isn’t, just as any of your nuanced imams might say.

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