Today

6th August.

Our “BBC is biased” community is to get some competition. From the Respect party. (H/T Deegee) 

The first half of their statement reads like something we might have said ourselves, here at “Is”:

“George Galloway has announced that he will establish his own public enquiry into the BBC’s role in reporting the events of the past few weeks in Gaza.    The Bradford West MP had previously announced that he is refusing to pay his licence fee until the BBC demonstrated a more impartial standard of broadcasting on the conflict. Galloway has been openly critical of the its editorial standpoint on the conflict, arguing that the BBC has a duty, as a publicly funded organisation, to adopt an unbiased approach to such major stories.”

We even agreed with him about the BBC’s abysmal failure to report the demonstration outside the BBC’s premises, but for slightly different reasons.

    “Many in the country were outraged when the BBC failed to report on the July 19th national demonstration which had been attended by tens of thousands of demonstrators. It belatedly addressed this with a hastily-arranged piece on its website, for which it had to borrow an image from a rival broadcaster. It has also been commented that since the outcry, the BBC’s reporting had apparently become more balanced.”

“This was in part down to the reporting of Middle East correspondent Jeremy Bowen from the front-line in Gaza. Strangely – indeed, inexplicably – Bowen is absent from the reporting this week as he is, according to Twitter, ‘on holiday’.”

Here’s where we diverge. I really don’t think the BBC would dare ‘sequester’ Jeremy Bowen - what about the all-powerful Zionist Lobby that they claim to be so terrified of? I do love the sagacious use of scare-quotes though. 

“ The BBC has been dogged by scandals in the past year and has faced questioning on its integrity, from the child abuse scandal to questions about executive pay-offs, with licence fee payers increasingly turning their backs on the institution in favour of other media outlets.    We will keep you up to date with the developments on the public enquiry. If you can help in any way with the enquiry, please email gallowayg@parliament.uk

A glimmer of light peeped through the fog last night when Douglas Murray was given a little bit of the BBC’s precious Israel-bashing time to debate with Ming Campbell.

First we saw Baroness W. stating her case. " Morally indefensible. On a point of principle. Norrin our interest. Resign.” 

Bye then.

Why did David Cameron take such an uncritical approach to Israel during the last few weeks, risking Warsi’s  fury? wondered Mark Urban.

Because he was clinging on to the last vestiges of reason before she made it well nigh impossible to do so? (Not that a PM with a backbone would have caved in) 

Clegg was shown calling for  Israel’s capitulation. “Vince agrees. Disproportionate. War crimes.”

“Disproportionate” screeched Ming over and over again. “Stop helping Israel defend itself” he pleaded. “International criminal court!”

Why doesn’t a senior Lib Dem resign? wondered  Kirsty Wark, wearing an alarmingly distracting jumper. (acid green, with  flounced and scalloped black lace cut-outs, since you ask) 

She allowed Douglas a few minutes to dispense the common sense for which he’s well known and deservedly respected. 

Suddenly Kirsty decided to cut him off in that rude, disrespectful manner they reserve for people who criticise Hamas, for that is exactly what he started to do. At which point Kirsty’s face clouded and he was toast. 

ON the bright side, wharrabout that  HardTalk with Zeinab Badawi and John Kerry? Badawi seemed uncharacteristically mellow. For once she  appeared over awed.   

Kerry was unequivocally supportive of Israel. Over to you Pat.