Tonight's The Report on Radio 4 took a scary look at anti-Semitism in the United Kingdom:
Anti-Semitism in the UK: Simon Cox investigates the changing face of prejudice against Jewish people after recent lethal attacks in Paris, Copenhagen and Brussels. With the Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, calling for European Jews to move to Israel, we look at whether there is more dangerous anti-Semitism online and on the streets of the UK.
You might have been expecting to hear a lot about the threat from Islamists, but no...
The vast bulk of the programme was devoted to the far-right - from Combat 18 in the '80s and '90s to National Action and Joshua Bonehead in the 21st Century - and the programme did a good job of exposing these scumbags to the public eye (even though the Combat 18 bit seemed somewhat historical).
The vast bulk of the programme was devoted to the far-right - from Combat 18 in the '80s and '90s to National Action and Joshua Bonehead in the 21st Century - and the programme did a good job of exposing these scumbags to the public eye (even though the Combat 18 bit seemed somewhat historical).
It certainly didn't hold back from shaming these marginal creeps - even broadcasting some of the disgusting tweets sent to Labour MP Luciana Berger, and quoting some of their odious 'justifications'.
Particularly shocking, however, were the experiences of Conservative MP Lee Scott.
He receives regular anti-Semitic death threats - including ones that target him late at night in parliament after his staff have gone home. He needs a team of around five people to watch out for his safety when he makes certain public appearances. Here in Britain, in 2015.
Mr Scott's experiences came at the central point of the programme, midway through the section devoted to the far-right.
In passing, however, it was mentioned that his abusers call him "an enemy of Islam". Quite who these Islam-defending abusers were wasn't speculated upon (Combat 18 leftovers? National Action? Bonehead? Someone else entirely?), and the focus on the far-right continued for a further nine minutes.
With just five minutes to go, however, the (half-hour-long) programme suddenly changed tack.
Presenter Simon Cox mentioned "a newer threat" to Britain's Jews.
An advisor to the police and the government said that anti-Semitism is an "endemic", "deep-rooted", "engrained" problem in the Muslim community...
...at which point the fierce, 'brave' tone of the programme (towards the fringe nutjobs of the far-right) suddenly vanished, and the BBC's habitual, culturally-sensitive apologism took over.
...at which point the fierce, 'brave' tone of the programme (towards the fringe nutjobs of the far-right) suddenly vanished, and the BBC's habitual, culturally-sensitive apologism took over.
Simon Cox quickly read out some of the excuses. He narrated the point that British Muslims have a harder time of it than British Jews, that they experience more attacks than British Jews [going, as statistical ignoramuses tend to do, for the bare totals and completely failing to relate them to proportions: i.e. to the much smaller proportion of Jews in Britain compared to Muslims], and that they suffer "Islamophobic" attacks on a "daily" basis.
He also said that many might see the advisor's criticisms as "a misleading and inaccurate portrayal of their views". (The advisor, in response, conceded that their are plenty of positive examples of British Muslims behaving in a friendly fashion towards British Jews, but that the problem of Muslim anti-Semitism remains.)
And, having spent a mere three minutes on the dangers posed by Muslim Jew-hatred (despite Paris and Copenhagen - and in contrast to the 16 minutes devoted to the far-right), Simon then moved on, towards his closing remarks...
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My closing remarks are this summary (which I emailed to Sue immediately after the programme, but which I know she won't mind me sharing):
'The Report' on Radio 4. It was about anti-Semitism in the UK. Most of it focused on the far-right. About three minutes were given to Muslim anti-Semitism, hedged with lots of caveats and several uses of the word "Islamophobic" - that Muslims are victims of more hate crimes than Jews, that they suffer abuse "daily". The anti-Semitism of the anti-Israel Left wasn't considered at all.
Maybe I should just have left it at that.
Are we really to believe (pace the BBC here) that the main danger to Britain's small Jewish community comes from the rabid, marginal boneheads of the British far-right?
Update 6/3: Not a Sheep's take on this is well worth reading - and accords very closely with my own. His conclusions?:
Are we really to believe (pace the BBC here) that the main danger to Britain's small Jewish community comes from the rabid, marginal boneheads of the British far-right?
Update 6/3: Not a Sheep's take on this is well worth reading - and accords very closely with my own. His conclusions?:
So there we have it, a half hour BBC programme on the rise of anti-Semitism in the UK that manages just three minutes on the problem of anti-Semitism in the UK's Muslim community and counters that with the BBC presenter casting doubt on the veracity of those claims. Just another typical piece of BBC programming that protects Muslims from criticism even when that criticism is from a British Muslim expert.
Also missing from this programme was any mention of the rise of anti-Semitism amongst the British left, especially at Universities and amongst the 'intelligensia'. But maybe investigating that source of anti-Semitism would be hitting too close to the BBC for their own comfort?
I didn't bother listening as I'd already guessed what the tenor of the programme would be; many thanks for confirming that.
ReplyDeleteIt sounds very much of a piece with a Panorama prog a few years ago where their reporters went bravely underground to reveal the perceived threat from lunatic-fringe right wing groups, as ever ignoring the incredibly real threat from Islamist groups.
The compilers of the R4 prog might usefully have interviewed Finchley & Golders Green MP Mike Freer, who a couple of years ago was physically attacked when holding a surgery at a mosque in his constituency, and called a Jewish pig (although he is not Jewish), and had to take refuge in a locked office. Predictably, no one was even cautioned, let alone arrested. So these thugs roam the streets while the local synagogue remains with heavy, locked gates, and under permanent protection from security guards.
I had the same reaction this morning when I heard the trailer on Radio 4...
ReplyDeleteOK quite an interesting subject...will surely mention Islam or at least Islamism...er - NO!!! Straight into the Far Right. Well yes of course we know they are a threat but are they a rising threat for Jews?
Yep - once again the BBC manages to spin things away from true centre. :(
Making an equivalence of Jews and Muslims is a category mistake. The latter have earned any wariness that the population feels regarding them. Jews are wary of Muslims because they have a long history of being killed and attacked by people of that religion. These attacks have been over millennia, though the attacks and expulsion from the Middle East accelerated over the last 100 years. Jewish people are experiencing the Arab Street in Europe as a result of large scale immigration from those regions. It's not complicated and for the BBC to ignore that and reach for some obscure groups of "Far Right" is dishonest. The obsession with the Far Right by the Left has always seemed to me a psychologically necessary construction but dragging it out of its grave to explain real physical attacks on Jews is absurd. I can't see the Jews and Muslims huddling together for mutual support as all those "Skinheads" patrol the streets. The question as always is: who does control the streets? Jews certainly don't.
ReplyDeleteI only listened to this programme this morning but blogged my thoughts live, with judicial use of the pause button to ensure that quoyes were correctly transcribed. I agree with your thoughts, here's my conclusion:
ReplyDelete'On what grounds does Simon Cox feel able to say '.. surely any Muslims listening to (the Muslim expert) would say that his was a misleading and inaccurate portrayal of his views.' How does Simon Cox know this? What research has he done to arrive at this conclusion? Or is this just another example of the usual BBC knee jerk defence of Muslims when they are being criticised?
So there we have it, a half hour BBC programme on the rise of anti-Semitism in the UK that manages just three minutes on the problem of anti-Semitism in the UK's Muslim community and counters that with the BBC presenter casting doubt on the veracity of those claims. Just another typical piece of BBC programming that protects Muslims from criticism even when that criticism is from a British Muslim expert.
Also missing from this programme was any mention of the rise of anti-Semitism amongst the British left, especially at Universities and amongst the 'intelligensia'. But maybe investigating that source of anti-Semitism would be hitting too close to the BBC for their own comfort?'
That I expected no better from the BBC saddens me.
The most worrying aspect of this kind of programme is that its real intention is not to highlight a growing Anti-Semitism, but rather to deflect attention away from it.
ReplyDeleteThere's apparently a UK version of the Paris walkabout by a Jewish journalist.
ReplyDeleteI wonder if the results will jibe with those the BBC has managed to arrive at?
The bottom line is that the BBC fears muslims but does not fear Jews and, as throughout its disgusting history, believes in appeasement.
ReplyDeleteIs tha the Grant who used to regularly comment on my blog? If so, then you have been missed...
ReplyDelete