Woe, woe and thrice woe!

According to Max Hastings, 

Cameron stumped the country (and some Tory critics of his election campaign) by repeating a simple message: that only his party can be trusted with the economy. Much of the media, and especially the BBC, did their utmost to play to Labour's campaign agenda, emphasising the NHS, welfare cuts, the homeless — the predicament of the bottom tenth of society.

But voters showed they recognise that at the heart of all decent government should be the interests and ambitions of the vast majority; the earners and not the spenders.

And according to Toby Young, 

The reason the Election result must have come as such a shock to the high-ups at the BBC is because its coverage of Ed Miliband and Labour has been so sympathetic for the past five years. Scarcely a week passed without a ‘yoof’ documentary on BBC3 about food banks or ‘the bedroom tax’ – in reality, a benefit cut – while the news that two million jobs had been created since 2010 hardly got a look in.

Whether you accept those (Conservative) criticisms of the BBC or not, I'd just ask you take a short trip back in time - back to Wednesday's night and the final pre-election Radio 4 current affairs programme: The World Tonight. 

The long closing discussion between presenter and pundits on what we should expect from the election, looking back, is hilarious. It's so full of embarrassingly wrong predictions and dodgy analysis that, i-Player permitting, it should provide a permanent reminder (an Ed Stone) of just what a load of complete codswallop much of the BBC's pre-election speculation has been.

That's not my main point, however. That's to recommend that you listen to presenter David Eades's extraordinary report from the Midlands (beginning some 8 minutes in) - a night-before-the-election piece from Nottingham (a city containing three safe Labour seats).

We heard from (a) a Green-voting punk band member/council worker who protests against the benefit cuts and denounces the money-men, (b) a Labour-supporting advice centre worker "with a pretty grim tale to tell", living in one of the most deprived areas in the country ("One in three are in poverty here. Unemployment is extremely high", said David Eades), who blames the welfare cuts for the poverty, homelessness and food banks and says only the richest have benefited over the last five years; (c) a small businessman whose new business has grown rapidly and taken on some 60 staff in the year since its inceptionm who wants a government for small and medium-sized businessman and who likes the coalition; (d) a public sector worker from the 'squeezed middle' who finds the job-market and care costs difficult, and life "hard" - harder over the past five years than the previous five years, and who finds things "demoralising and frustrating".

As you will have noticed, that makes 3 unhappy people v 1 happy person, as regards the outgoing coalition government and the state it left the country in. 

The left-wing criticisms and accompanying tales of woe accounted for 74% of David Eades's report; the pro-coalition positive tales of economic growth accounted for just 26% of his report.

That's precisely the kind of BBC report Max Hastings and Toby Young have in mind, and there it was on the final pre-election current affairs programme on BBC Radio 4.

Don't they have a point?

Whitewashing Sex Gangs III

Mary Hockaday

This week's Newswatch with Samira Ahmed discussed the BBC's coverage of the Oxford street grooming case. In the course of the programme Samira interviewed the head of the BBC newsroom, Mary Hockaday. 

The section began with an extract from last Tuesday's Six O'Clock News on BBC One:

Newsreader: The court heard how the girls were plied with alcohol and drugs before being abused. The men will be sentenced next month. Just to warn you, Tom Symond's report contains disturbing details of the gang's activities.

Reporter: The men behind one of the most serious cases in recent years of what's become known as "street grooming. Their victims vulnerable young teenage girls in Oxford.

The majority of Newswatch correspondents complained that the Muslim or "Asian" element was being "underplayed". Three such complaints were read out.

- "Your report tonight went to bizarrely contrived efforts to disguise the obvious sectarian element involved ie gangs of Muslim men grooming and raping girls drawn from indigenous non-Muslim groups."

- "This huge story is being slanted quite outrageously by BBC News. This is racially organised targeting of sexual violence on minors, and is far from an isolated case. You are deliberately ignoring that and being racist is your partiality."

- "Why do you never mention the religion of those mentioned in sexual abuse cases? We all know they are predominantly Muslim." 

The part of the interview with Mary Hockaday which dealt with this matter is worth transcribing (before Newswatch vanishes from the i-Player), especially in the light of our earlier posts on this issue - and the comments of Dr. Taj Hargey:

Samira Ahmed: The six o'clock lead story, which we showed a clip of at the beginning there...no mention of ethnicity or religion until the end of the second background package, eight minutes in; in fact no mention at all of the fact they were Muslim. Why?

Mary Hockaday: This was reporting of a court case and, primarily, the task was to report the findings, the verdicts and what had happened, and for much of our reporting and our court reporting we were conveying the details and the information of what had emerged through the trial and then particularly on that day. Part of it is, as you say, in our reporting with Alison Holt, we did come to the issue of the ethnicity of the defendants...

Samira Ahmed (interrupting): It was mentioned very, very briefly, right at the very end. I mean, there have been five similar cases now - Shropshire, Rochdale, Rotherham, Oldham and Derby as well...there's a great blog-post by Mark Easton about it on the BBC website...The charge is that the BBC seemed to be more worried about offending Pakistani Muslims that it did about covering all the issues - and it was relevant to the case.  

Mary Hockaday: Yes, I can absolutely assure you that was not our particular concern on that day. We certainly do not attempt to slant our coverage and we certainly don't ignore any aspects of the case. What we're trying to do is report it in the round, and actually during the court case the word used usually by the police was "Asian". We undertook to make our own further enquiries so that we were sure about the more detailed ethnicity of the defendants and that is something - many of Pakistan heritage, some of North African - that we included in our reporting through the day on the channel. We discuss all stories, both about the accuracy, the weight, the issues arisen, and in these cases very much about the language used....

Samira Ahmed (interrupting): But on this, were reporters told "Don't use the word 'Muslim' or don't say they're Asian up front. I mean...

Mary Hockaday: We don't tell our reporters. We don't give them a sort of rule book for language. We are asking them to report accurately. If you look at the reporting as a whole, both on the Six O'Clock News then on all the other outlets, these are not issues that we shied away from. I mean, as you say...

Samira Ahmed (interrupting): But on the Six O'Clock News you did. 

Mary Hockaday: ...Mark Easton in his blog and also on air, Alison Holt, in many of the guests in discussions, the issues you've touched on, but also others - the questions for the police, for the social services, the broader question I think for all of us that we see reflected in the very many different kinds of child abuse and exploitation cases that we found ourselves reporting on, about how this society does or doesn't listen to children.

That was an instance of fine interviewing by Samira. 

It has to be said, however, that the edition of the Six O'Clock News under discussion does sound to have downplayed the sectarian element in the story. The evidence provided by Samira makes that plain and little that Mary Hockaday said in response really countered that charge. She was also rather evasive about the "Muslim question".

I did also raise an eyebrow at Mary's contention that "We don't tell our reporters. We don't give them a sort of rule book for language" as I was under the impression that certain words were specifically discouraged under the corporation's Editorial Guidelines - "terrorist", for instance - and that, say for their Israel-Palestinian coverage, they has long existing what could be described as "a sort of rule book for language". 

Was the Six O'Clock News an exception? 

Carolyn Quinn

It might be instructive to check out how that evening's P.M. on Radio 4 one hour earlier dealt with the story. 

Although both of the introductions provided by Carolyn Quinn (to the whole programme and to Mike Sargeant's report) shied away from any mention of matter racial or religious, the coverage did twice mention the Pakistani and North African ethnicity of the abusers (in passing), though Mike Sergeant didn't mention the ethnicity of their victims anywhere in his report; indeed, his report stayed away from any ethnic or Muslim angle until, towards the end, he suddenly said that there are "questions for the Muslim community". He didn't spell out what those questions were though, and then featured an Oxford imam saying that enough's enough, that the community should tackle the issue and it shouldn't be swept under the carpet. Listeners unfamiliar with the story might have been left wondering why the imam was saying that. The following interview between Carolyn and Natasha Finlayson of the Who Cares Trust avoided such issues altogether. 

So, unlike the Six O'Clock News, the "Muslim" issue was raised on P.M., albeit very briefly and with no context being give for the benefit of Radio 4 listeners. The angle, therefore, wasn't ignored but it clearly was downplayed. 

By the time of that night's The World Tonight the main news bulletin was informing listeners of the Pakistani and North African ethnicity of the abusers and that "the girls were white". The failure of the authorities to look out for vulnerable girls was one of the two main angles, with the county council's role coming in for the strongest questioning but presenter David Eades then laid out the other - albeit using the "Asian" word that infuriates so many, including many non-Muslim Asians:

The inescapable truths of this case are twofold: That again the authorities failed to protect vulnerable girls and again that a gang overwhelmingly of Asian men were found guilty of appalling abuse of white girls. The echoes of Rochdale and Rotherham are clear. It's also clear the local Asian community in the Oxford area fear the impact all this could have on them. The Asian Network's Catrin Nye has been there to gauge their views.

Catrin Nye

Catrin's report on the Pakistani community emphasised how "tight knit" the community is. Everyone knew the perpetrators. She talks to one young man and asks him what impact this might have. He says people with daughters might start thinking all young Asian men are paedos, which is wrong, because it's a small minority that have done something wrong. Every race and creed is doing it, he says.  Other man says much the same.  It's every race and creed. The view is expressed that a flash, gangster element has come in and preyed on the girls just because they are vulnerable. Another expresses caution about talking about the issue, says they should stick together and repeats much the same 'everyone's doing it' line as the previous vox pops. It's every race and creed. Two others say it's nothing to do with their religion after Catrin asks them what they make of the charge that Muslim men disrespect non-Muslim women. She says they are all concerned about a backlash as a result of this case. 

A very clear message was conveyed by that report: Every race and creed is doing it. 

David Eades then continued, persisting with his "Asian" formulation - which he never deviated from:

As with the other well-documented cases, the crimes in Oxford do provoke argument as to how much focus should be placed on that Asian connection. I spoke to Yasmin Qureshi, Labour MP for Bolton South. She's a lawyer and Asian, and I asked her whether it's inevitable that young Asian men, like the ones we've just heard from, would feel tarnished by this case?

Yasmin Qureshi said, yes, she understood. It's like how young Afro-Caribbean men were stereotyped years ago, she claimed. The Pakistani origin of many of the abusers in these cases shouldn't mean they aren't investigated, she continued, but as "I know of" "one defendant" in "one case" who raped his own daughter, so "it can't be to do with culture or religion" [Yes, she really did say that!!!] 

So, do you think dwelling on the Pakistani ethnicity of the perps and the white ethnicity of the girls is "out of order?", asked David Eades. "I think that is not right and it is not helpful in the debate," she replied, before going on to attack media reporting. This is about opportunity and vulnerability, she claimed. 

David Eades pointed to people who say, yes, but it keeps happening, meaning there's "a trend" - to which the Labour MP responded that the victims in these cases "just happen to be young girls" [yes, she really did phrase it like that], they're from broken homes, in care, vulnerable, young, alone, lost. The men pick on them for their vulnerability. 

Yasmin Qureshi, MP

But, David persisted, "these are organised groups from the same ethnic background". Only because "they happen to socialise with each other, because they happen to know each other", Yasmin replied.

Well, you can't say that the issue of ethnicity wasn't aired by The World Tonight. The issue of Islam, however, was downplayed again - especially by the programme's presenter. The choice of speakers with regards to this aspect of the story, however, was biased entirely in favour of those defending the "Asian" community against the charges we often hear, including from other "Asian" spokespeople such as Taj Hargey and Mohammed Shafiq. 

Whitewashing sex gangs? There certainly seems to have been an element of that, doesn't there? - at least in these three BBC programmes from Tuesday 14th May. It could have been worse though. At least The World Tonight showed that the BBC was venturing a little bit further than it might once have done. 

Boston

Some 24 hours on from the deeply inhumane bombings in Boston, we seem to be no clearer as to the identity or the motivation of the perpetrators of this hideous crime. The U.S. authorities are still investigating and are remaining cautious in their statements. 

As so often happens after such events, while the facts are unknown, speculation begins to fill the airwaves and the internet. After the massacre in Norway, there was something of a rush to blame the killings on Muslim terrorists. After the massacre in Toulouse, there was something of a rush to blame the killings on right-wing extremists. 

Were the perpetrators of the marathon bombings domestic right-wing extremists, foreign jihadi extremists or something else altogether (whether left-wing or non-political)? We simply don't know and it would surely be much better if we all kept the speculation to a bear minimum - though that's hardly likely to happen in the age of the internet and 24 hour news. 

In amongst the moving testimony and the fine reporting of the BBC's Security Correspondent Gordon Corera, this morning's Today programme on Radio 4 - especially its presenters Justin Webb and Evan Davis - engaged in quite a good deal of speculation. Their speculation led them to favour the theory that domestic, right-wing extremists are the more likely perpetrators. Whether it turns out to be sound speculation only time will tell.

Given the anger the programme's coverage is generating at Biased BBC (see here, here, here and here), it might be helpful to transcribe representative parts of the programme. 

Please see what you make of it.

6.53

Evan Davis: President Obama speaking there. Not using the word 'terrorism' to describe the event. And some conversations in this news room and others around the place about 'Is this the biggest terror atrocity in the United States since 9/11?'  and some doubt over the use of these words or those comparisons, simply because there was the Fort Hood shootings some years back and the Americans have been very reluctant to classify that as a terror attack.

Justin Webb: It was interesting what Gordon Corera was saying ten minutes or so ago about that. And Fort Hood is a sort of classic case of where Americans have been dividing recently on the subject of terrorism. And it's..the Fort Hood case was a case of mass murder. There's no question about that. It took place in 2009. There is a man who has been arraigned and is the only suspect and is going to face a trial and possible eventual execution. And there's no doubt at all that 13 people died. But the issue is whether or not it was a terrorist attack, whether he had been in touch with al-Qaeda, whether he was motivated by Islamic extremism and the view of the federal government has been that that wasn't necessarily the case, that it was potentially just a case of mass murder. And it has very much invigorated those who wanted to accuse President Obama of not looking after America properly and has been to a kind of accusation that the federal government tends to cover up and avoid using the word 'terrorism' whenever it can and I think that that's one of the things..one of the political things that's going to inform quite a lot of the..or if 'inform' is quite the right word..but sort of effect quite a lot of the coverage in the United States over the next 24 hours or so.

7.26

Evan Davis: Before we go to sport, just some words on why people have been very quick to speculate about the significance of yesterday for those Boston explosions, the marathon explosions. It was Patriots' Day, which actually commemorates the opening battles of the American revolutionary war but perhaps more significant in the speculation is the fact that this week contains a number of unhappy anniversaries - the Oklahoma City bombing, the Waco, Texas assaults, the Columbine school shooting and the Virginia Tech massacre. All took part this week, and two of those tragedies - the Virginia Tech massacre and the Waco assault - were, in fact, themselves on the Patriots' Day of those years. People are trying to draw all sorts of conclusions and significance. Whether that tilts you towards believing it was a domestic terror rather than imported in the States [sic], but the authorities remaining very cautious at this stage.

7.36 

Justin Webb: We were discussing on the programme only yesterday how increasingly relaxed Americans were about the threat of an attack on their soil. So how's the nation going to react? In large part, of course, that is going to depend on who is responsible and that, as we've been saying in the programme repeatedly this morning, is not yet known.

7.39 

Justin Webb (to P.J. Crowley,  former U.S. Assistant Secretary of State): But it's a fact, isn't it, that America's politics have been pretty poisonous in recent years and if this does turn out to be a domestically-inspired act of terrorism then it will lead to...I mean really every bit as much soul-searching...albeit in a different direction... as if it was something that was directed at the United States, if you like, ultimately from abroad.

7.40 

Justin Webb (to P.J. Crowley): Final question about Barack Obama. He has a task now, hasn't he, as president? That traditional task of bringing the nation together. Given all the political heat that there is in the United States at the moment and the dislike of him, the extreme dislike of him, among some sections of the Republican Party, is he able, do you think, at this moment to bring the nation together? Can he perform that role?

8.10

Justin Webb: It is, of course, worth noting that the death toll in Boston was much less than that in bomb attacks in Iraq yesterday. There were doubtless children killed there too. But that doesn't reduce the horror for Boston or for America.

8.15 Evan Davis (to Rick Nelson, CSIS, Washington): It doesn't appear to have been suicide bombers. I wonder whether that, in some sense, would tilt you away from Islamist towards domestic terrorists of some kind?

8.15 Evan Davis (to Rick Nelson, CSIS, Washington): We know it was Patriots' Day and a holiday in Boston yesterday. How significant might that be do you think? Or is it just the day the Boston marathon is run and, so, if you want to create carnage at the marathon that's the day you do it?

8.18 Evan Davis (to Rick Nelson, CSIS, Washington): Everything you're saying just points to 'Keep calm. Take it slowly. Do it accurately. Don't jump to conclusions to quickly'.

8.19  Evan Davis (to Gordon Corera): Gordon, after all the words of Mr Nelson there, warning us to be cautious, not to jump to conclusions, looking at this it seems as though the evidence is tipping towards some kind of domestic terrorism rather than something more Middle Eastern-related. Just because of the day, the fact that it isn't suicide bombers. I don't know, is that the way you feel the security industry in the United States is heading in its mind?

Gordon Corera (to Evan Davis): I think they're still being very cautious here, I have to say. It's not just the White House, but a lot of other people are being cautious about that. There are certain indicators you could take to say and suggest that perhaps this is more domestic focused - as you say, Patriot Day, which is a day in Massachusetts which marks the start of the revolutionary war; Tax Day, when Americans have to file their taxes; some other anniversaries of other events in the past linked to domestic home-grown extremism. Certainly they have lead some people to suggest that this is more likely, that kind of attack. Others have then said though that attacking a marathon would be very unusual for such a group. They've tended to attack government targets (on the whole, not always), targets associated with the federal government. Attacking a group of civilians, of ordinary people like that, would be something more typical of a jihadist group. So I think you can see how there are arguments both ways which are making people cautious. So I think because of that there is a very clear focus on finding the evidence rather than speculating.
[Gordon Corera then mentions leads being investigated by the authorities - a "dark-skinned male"; people with backpacks; a student from Saudi Arabia - but continues advising caution].

8.52
Evan Davis (to Bill Bratton, former police chief in Boston, L.A. and New York): There's been tremendous maturity in terms of not trying to jump to conclusions and everyone's being incredibly cautious. I wonder whether people are being perhaps overly cautious on this occasion. I mean, the reluctance to use the word 'terror' for example, that what looks like...very obviously like a terror event.

8.53
Evan Davis (to Bill Bratton): In terms of looking at the clues, two bombs presumably make it unlikely it was just one lone individual acting purely off his own back, a kind of Unibomber-type character?

Bill Bratton: That would be very speculative at this time.



UPDATE 17/4: The tendency to view major events through the filters of your own biases (such as mine to view them through the filter of BBC bias), seems to be hard to resist. 

That interview between Justin Webb and P.J. Crowley (a Democrat), where Justin speculated that the extreme dislike for President Obama found in parts of the Republican Party might prove divisive in coming days, suggests a filter on the part of certain BBC reporters. I was struck by this late last night, given that The World Tonight's coverage of the Boston bombings also introduced and pursued that very angle - as you can see from presenter David Eades's introduction:

I'll ask a Republican senator if President Obama's critics can resist making political capital out of the bombing.

That was indeed the angle he pursued while interviewing Congressman Scott Perry, introducing the subject in the course of the discussion. Congressman Perry had been in no way critical of the president and remained supportive of the president's response, expressing (in response to David's questions) distaste for using events like this for political purposes. His entire contribution showed that using the event for political purposes had been very far from his mind and he hadn't been doing it - and yet David Eades still pursued the 'political capital' angle with him, using some comments by Republican Senator Mitch McConnell that the U.S. had allowed complacency about the threat of terrorism to creep in since 9/11 - which doesn't seem to me to be a party political point at all - as a pretext for this line of questioning. 

As a result the thought crossed my mind that it was David Eades, following in Justin Webb's wake, who was seeking to make political capital out of this. It seemed rather unnecessary. 

But, then again, I may have my own filters in action and could be doing to David and Justin what I'm now accusing them of doing. Which wouldn't necessarily make me wrong about this. You will have to make your own minds up (avoiding your own filters perhaps).

'The World Tonight' - and last night, and the night before...

Continuing to review the past week's editions of BBC Radio 4's The World Tonight, I want to surf my way over the choppy waters of the last five days and see how often the shark of bias lurks beneath, ready to bite off the leg of impartiality. So to speak.

19/11/2012

Besides the Israel-Gaza conflict, this edition looked at Burma in the light of President Obama's visit to the Asian nation. Is the West seeking to draw Burma away from its traditional ties to China? Carolyn Quinn spoke to Josh Kurlantzick from the American think-tank, the Council on Foreign Relations, about the country's foreign relations. It was an interesting interview. 

Then there was a report by James Reynolds on anti-Assad Syrian refugees in Turkey. They don't like Bashar one bit. There have been repeated accusations that the BBC has been far too embedded - literally and emotionally - with the Syrian rebels. This report won't have undermined that impression (however unfair it may be). Its themes were the plight of refugee children, the badness of the Assad regime, the eagerness of the rebels, the unease of the Turkish state. 

The impending rebel seizure of Goma in Eastern Congo (DRC) was next up for discussion. Gabriel Gatehouse talked to Carolyn. The under-reporting of the various wars in the Democratic Republic of Congo over the last couple of decades remains one of the scandals of modern reporting. Compare it to the saturation coverage of events in Gaza or the West Bank. Deaths in the DRC since 1996 appear to have topped the 5 million mark (at least) - an extraordinary tally of human suffering. It tells you something that when you do a simple search on the BBC News website, the 'News' results bring up 6,793 results for "Congo" (with includes results for the other Congo - Congo Brazzaville - too) and   14,984 for "Israel". If you assume the figure to be 5 million dead in the DRC over that period and compare it to the figure (14,500) given by Wikipedia for deaths in the Israel-Palestinian conflict since 1948 (i.e. over a far longer period) you find that the recent wars in the Congo have killed some 370 times more people - in other words, VASTLY more. The BBC, of course, has been far from alone in under-reporting the plight of the Congolese and massively over-reporting the 'plight' of the Palestinians. Still, a myriad numbers of wrongs doesn't make a right. That is all a preamble to saying 'Well done!' to The World Tonight for giving up under five minutes of Monday's edition to the story. That said, they spent 16 minutes on Israel-Gaza (over 3 times as long). 

The programme ended with a report from the BBC's Guy De Launey on the growing friendship between a U.S. stealth fighter pilot (Dale Zelko) and the Serb artillery operator (Zoltan Dani) who shot him down in 1999 - the subject of a documentary called 'The Second Meeting'.  We heard from the two men and the director. Interesting. 

20/11/2012

As well as the women bishops and the Gaza sections (reviewed in earlier posts), Tuesday's edition discussed Afghanistan. Paddy Ashdown says Western nation-building has failed in the country (said host Ritula Shah). There have been failures galore, but there has been some good done...by the European Union. Paul Moss reported on the EU's involvement in training the ill-reputed Afghan police force. The Afghan people are grateful. The EU trainers are pleased with their work. The EU's top man in this field is pleased too. Where the US and Britain have failed, the EU is succeeding it seems. That was one of the messages of that report, I think. It's very rare to hear a positive report about Western intervention in Afghanistan. Interesting that it reflects so well on the European Union, isn't it?

BBC: Firing bias into Israel?

Some parts of the domestic BBC clearly remain open to charges of bias. Radio 4's The World Tonight on this week has struck me offering a view instances of that. I'll spread out the evidence for this claim over a few posts, lest this first one reach infinity and beyond.

Monday night's edition

Presenter Carolyn Quinn began the Israel/Gaza bit on Monday night's edition by focusing on the 'plight' of those in Gaza, rather than on focusing on the 'plight' of people in both Gaza and Israel: 

"People in Gaza are bracing themselves for what could be another night of bombardment as Israeli forces continue the air strikes they say [her emphasis] are intended to stop Hamas firing rocket attacks [sic] in Israel. The death toll in Gaza has exceeded 100. 3 Israelis have been killed since Wednesday."

The introduction to her first guest then began:

"Since 2007 the Gaza Strip has been subject to an intensified Israeli blockade. It was captured during the 1967 war and Israel still maintains control of Gazan airspace and its waters in the Mediterranean. It's one of the most densely-populated and poorest areas in the world with a population of approximately one and a half million Palestinians. Just over half of its inhabitants are under the age of 18. Unemployment is high and 80% of the population is dependent on aid to survive. So where is its population drawn from and why do they stay there? Dr Izzeldin Abuelaish is a Palestinian doctor and infertility specialist. In 2009 three of his daughters were killed in the family home in Gaza by Israeli shells. He now campaigns for peace in the Middle East and teaches at the University of Toronto. I asked him when his family had first arrived in Gaza."

[Sue: "It's one of the most densely-populated and poorest areas in the world with a population of approximately one and a half million Palestinians."
This particular phrase is one of these “We’ve heard it all befores” http://hurryupharry.org/2012/11/19/we%E2%80%99ve-heard-it-all-before/. And, of course it’s inaccurate, as for that matter, is the term Palestinians, but that’s another story.]


The interview then ran as follows: 

Dr Abuelaish:  "My family came to Gaza after 1948, after they were exiled from their homeland and became refugees in the Jabalia refugee camp."

Carolyn Quinn: "And how long did they remain in that camp?"

Dr Abuelaish: "It's the whole of their lives. I was born in that camp. I was raised and lived in that camp till now. My extended family is living there. My house is still there."

Carolyn Quinn: "So you still have family living in Gaza?"

Dr Abuelaish: "My five brothers and three sisters, my nephews, my nieces, my cousins, all of my people are living there."

Carolyn Quinn: "And as a place to live it has obviously been extremely traumatic for people living there under bombardment. Can you describe what it was like to be a Gazan?"

Dr Abuelaish: "You know the life to be Gazan there, where everything in your life you want for yourself in London and you are enjoying it..but for Gazans, the people there, and they're teenagers who are working as the graduate of the universities and they are at the process of building their life and to say to them their life to turn its back to them. Unemployed. There is no life in Gaza Strip. There is no electricity. There is no future  in Gaza Strip. But all of this...who made it? It's man-made."

Carolyn Quinn: "What about those people who would wish to leave?"

Dr Abuelaish: "We need to ask why do they want to leave. They want to survive. They are forced to leave. It's not by their choice. But life was hard for them to push them to leave. They are pushed to leave."

Carolyn Quinn: "Now, you have spent much of your life trying to seek peace in the conflict between Israel and Palestine. You yourself have sustained a terrible tragedy with three of your daughters being killed in your family home in Gaza. What hope do you hold that there could, some time, be an end to this?"

Dr Abuelaish: "You know, when you speak about peace, peace is not a word. Peace is an action. Peace is a way of life. Peace, where we engage in it, we touch it, we live it. And even now, the peace issue, it became a peace industry, peace business, and we don't see peace. 

Carolyn Quinn: "That's Dr Izzeldin Abuelaish there, who campaigns for peace in the Middle East."

[Sue: That programme you've written about is typical. Poor Carolyn Quinn is wrong, and the Palestinian doctor has become quite a celebrity since his family was killed. It’s very sad in so many ways. But that life-in-Gaza  approach is cheap. And how often do you really get to see what life is like for Israelis under these random rocket attacks.  I’ve experienced one by the way, so I’m not just romancing. And how many times do we get to see the wealthy areas in Gaza on the MSM. Of course it is terrible that people in Gaza have no shelters etc etc, but they could have if Hamas hadn’t diverted resources to their precious Jihad. The lack of electricity is, I believe self-inflicted.]