Radio 4 Today
Radio 4 Today gratuitous item about "Arab Pop Idol"
Radio 4 Today
Radio 4 Today
etc
etc ......
Well,
is the BBC biased?
Update:
BBC Watch has dealt more fully with this topic.
“Husain followed the usual format seen in BBC reporting from the Gaza Strip: high on pathos and slogans, low on facts and context.”
Beginning with the BBC’s obligatory “Israel says” (The BBC sows seeds of doubt over the validity of Israel’s claim of security needs) - the absence of any background to the litany of hardships she describes in her report gives Husain complete freedom to imply that all problems and hardships are due to Israel’s malevolence.
I’m extremely pushed for time, but - please go here.
Perhaps not merely biased, but obsessed.
ReplyDeleteWhy doesn't Husain deal with the awful social, economic and health problems in the countries she came from - Pakistan and Saudi Arabia. She never has a bad word to say about either despite the vicious, unrelenting oppression of non-Muslims, the oppression of women and gays, the forced marriages, the FGM, the appalling poverty and exploitation of its lowest class workers, attacks on domestic staff, obscene concentration of wealth and horrific levels of corruption. Why, when she knows so much about both countries?
ReplyDeleteMishal interviewed somebody I think from UNWRA who said that as Israel knew all what was happening in Gaza perhaps it could allow those the who were peace loving Gazans to travel unrestricted into Israel. Knowing that terrorists have in the past fired rockets from Gazan hospitals, strapped explosives onto children and hidden in ambulances, the ability to trust anyone from Gaza must stretch the Israelis to the limit. Mishal could have asked the UNWRA man about this, but she took his word without question.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
DeleteI find BBC coverage to be biased in favour of Israel as is all coverage in the MSM. There are certain matters to do with Jews of which it is difficult to speak or write. Their criticism is more intelligent, more persistent, more threatening and more influential. They occupy an overwhelmingly disproportionate number of posts in the higher managerial and editorial echelons of the MSM. I was told that all FOI requests to the BBC to determine how many of their staff are Jewish are refused. They have browbeaten politicians, the media and the Criminal Prosecution Service into accepting a definition of antisemitism that is so exclusive as to allow anything regarded as offensive by any member of the Jewish community to be grounds for prosecution. Nothing highlights the absurdity of the definition more than including so-called tropes – congruent opinions that have grown from the experience of different societies over the centuries, something that in any other context we would regard as the strongest evidence possible.
ReplyDeleteNow where have I heard all that nonsense before?
DeleteTerry,
DeleteYes, a couple of minutes Googling shows that this commenter believes “the root cause (of antisemitism) lies in the behaviour of the Jews”. In other words he thinks Machiavellian Jews are the architects of their own misfortune.
He doesn’t engage with other commenters so his provocative sniping is pointless.
Once again the BBC tries to fool the public that they are investigate journalists when in fact they are a fully paid-up activist organisation. Which rather begs the question, if our licence fee is being spent to assist the propaganda machine of Hamas and other extreme groups, are we the public inadvertently funding a terrorism?
ReplyDeleteInvestigative!
DeleteAt risk of another Blogger/twitter URL clash, here's the reply I offered:
ReplyDeleteIt Can All Be Sorted In Post
No link, but on FB the BBC are clearly throwing a lot at this still.
ReplyDelete****
The Today Programme
2 hrs ·
In Gaza, 2m people are poised to slip deeper into poverty, and basic services are at risk of collapse, according to the UN.
The economy has been badly affected by a blockade maintained by Israel and Egypt, which Israel says it to stop Hamas from importing weapons and staging attacks.
Inside Gaza, 54% of the labour force is unemployed, according to the World Bank, and the UN says 97% of tap water is unfit for human consumption.
Mishal Husain visited the Bolbol family.
****
Pleased to say that most comments could be going better.
I await an answer to a question I posed as to what Egypt 'says' its reasons for a blockade are.