and tomorrow

Sarah Montague acts out the news headlines with colourful vocal intonation. It reminds me of a 12 year-old of my acquaintance practicing for a speech and drama recital. ‘You have to put expression in’ she said as she grappled with the challenge of injecting emotion into a poem about an owl.

The way Sarah Montague says ‘Gaza’ is a typical example. She enunciates it as one trying to evoke a little kitten. ‘Aww,  Gaaahza’. On the other hand,  the word ‘Israel’ is expelled with audible spittle-fleck. She must be visualising a rattlesnake.

We’ve already had an avalanche of emoting about Gaza. Now that televised DEC appeals are being prepared, things are set to become more intense. With Hamas very much in charge, how will the aid agencies be able to channel the funds to the intended recipients? That is the question the media should be asking.   

Instead they’re merely asking “Why is this any different from last time, when the BBC’s decision not to show it on the grounds of impartiality caused all that fuss?” 

Rather than asking how we can be sure that aid will not go to bolster Hamas’s arsenal of rockets, they’re much more interested in picking away, retrospectively, at what they see as an injustice, with all the attendant  implications of that. 

Unconditionally supplying aid without requiring any concessions whatsoever from Hamas already smacks of rewarding terror, but definitely give aid. Make sure it goes to the people, not to Hamas. 

Even Israel, we’re told, has admitted it’s a humanitarian crisis. Also, ‘the people at the BBC are different’, which translates as “since last time, cowardly Mark Thompson has slunk off, leaving brave Tony Hall to restore righteous humanitarianism to the BBC.”

What has really prompted this change of heart?   Why, it’s public opinion!

Emboldened by a tacit relaxation of the embargo against antisemitism, which was brought about by the force of public opinion, which in turn was brought about by an intense anti-Israel media campaign, all that half-suppressed antisemitism is unleashed. People now know they can get away with it. 

Twitter has always been a beacon of transparency. But the ”Tweets my own” clause exonerates the BBC from responsibility for the antisemitism therein. Jonathan Dimbleby, one of Jeremy Bowen’s staunchest defenders when he was admonished by the BBC  for bias, has tweeted:

“A fact: Hamas was elected. Two questions: are its ‘militants‘ more aggressive that those they’ve been fighting? If not why use that term?  

Brilliant. First of all as every bloody fule kno, Hamas was not simply elected. It did receive 44.45% of the votes in 2006  after which it threw its political opponents from tall buildings with their hands tied together, imposed strict Islamic laws, started amassing  stocks of armaments from other Islamist regimes, diverted cement and millions of $s of aid money, built a network of underground passages, and never held another election.  Furthermore it refuses to amend its core charter, ever,  which is dedicated to the elimination of Israel. So yes, ‘militants’ is not the best term for them, but the BBC has embargoed the use of the word that fits.

Nick Clegg and the chorus of MPs calling for an arms embargo on Israel ought to think twice.

First: Their reasoning implies that they think Israel attacks Palestinians for sport. 

Second. If they are calling for a boycott, they (we) might have to do without quite a lot of things we didn’t bargain for, not least of which is intelligence, something our security services probably rely on. Starting with Bradford, apparently.

If I were Israel I wouldn’t want to share, would you?

An arms embargo is motivated by pure antisemitism. It’s implying motives and intentions to the Israelis for which there is no evidence. Their reasoning is simply that Israel killed a lot of civilians, “end of”.

Never mind that Hamas could have put an immediate stop to that at any time, but chose not to.

   

It is also immensely hypocritical. During the time Nick Clegg and Baroness Warsi were in government, (you can get this WSJ article via Google) arms sales were approved (a variety of armaments and weapons to Moscow and ‘dual use chemicals’ to Bashir Al Assad’s Syria) without so much as a murmur from the Lib Dems or the good Baroness. 

The public has been manipulated by the BBC almost as much as the BBC has been manipulated by Hamas. It’s mutually assured deception.

A Tweet exposed the on Biased BBC by contributor and Twitter specialist DB, from a BBC foreign correspondent named Matthew Price recommended:

"Israel, as a colony, cannot continue to exist" - interesting article -"

The article he linked to was a piece in the Huffington Post, which virtually calls for Israel to be disbanded. Jews back to where they came from (presumably including those that fled from the Arab countries that threw them out in 1948)  and the right of return granted to the Palestinians and their millions of descendants.

Another tweet from Price links to a bizarre hatefest from Brian Eno, a musician.

“Late tweet of this. Brian Eno on Gaza. Just read it while watching WW1 commemoration from Mons. Poignant.” 

Take a quick look at Matthew Price's Twitter feed.  You can easily tell what sort of impartiality Mr. Price brings to the table.

Who cares? Did I hear you ask? We should.

  

Another  Tweet by Matthew Price on July 31st states:

"End of my era - after 12 years as a BBC Foreign Correspondent I'm off to @BBCr4today to be their Chief Correspondent. Exciting times!"

Yes. very exciting.