John Humphrys tells us why Hamas exists

Because of the occupation.

I understand the BBC’s revamp, which includes the reputedly unpopular “Sounds” was part of a drive to get down with the kidz - God,  now I sound like that judge who was unacquainted wiv da Beatles - I’m not him. He.

They say they’re aiming to attract the youth, anyway. (Should the BBC be targeting specific demographics? BBC Asian? Women’s Hour? As an ancient, out of touch judge, am I allowed to watch BBC Three? Or is it exclusively for teenagers?)

Not so long ago one could log on, search for ‘the Today Programme’, click on “Running Order” and arrive at the proposed daily timings of the upcoming items including a detailed guest list (albeit subject to change.)

Now they’ve meddled with the website and introduced an obstacle to bloggers about BBC bias, and anyone else who wants to find out exactly what the hell they’ve just been listening to. This change ensures that we can no longer easily listen again to a particular item or identify a particular spokesperson; you now have to use Google, (other search engines are available) to identify the name of the Hamas spokesperson with the impenetrable accent and the samey-similar-sounding name (with multiple alternative  spellings) to any other Hamas spokesterrorist. And all with or without the help of your supernatural powers.

At first, I thought I should search for Islam Hamad. But no.  This was none of the Islam Hamads that came up on Google. Then I realised it was Issam, not Islam, and had another go. Of course, Issam is also spelt Essam, which is par for the course, but it doesn’t help.

You know who I miss? Ron Prosor. When he was Israel’s Ambassador here, he could charm the pants off even the most BBCish presenter. His voice was so fruity he made Geoffrey Cox sound like a Smurf. And voices are important, especially on the radio - that’s why so many women fail the ‘pleasant sounding voice’ test. Mishal Husain’s voice with its scrapey harshness and Martha Kearney’s with its soft but grating timbre. I know they can’t help it any more than Caster Semenya can help her testosterone level. There’s a harshness about this injustice - but, you know, horses for courses. 

I once watched John Humphrys trying to learn how to make a painting. His hopelessness made him appear more ‘master of none’ than Jack of all trades, but I can see that Jack of all trades is what a Today Programme presenter has to be. 

Even so, it would be reassuring to know that your BBC presenter has a basic grasp of an issue that has come up repeatedly over the years, especially if he happens to have been in the trade for almost as many decades as the issue itself has been an actual issue. 

You’ll have realised that I’m talking about the item that came up at about 2h 43s into the programme. I don’t think I know how to link to the exact moment now that “playt=“ has been excised, but if I found it, so can you. I don’t think I can be bothered to transcribe the interviews in full. I’m not in the mood. Just scroll to 2:42:52

Obviously, it was about the latest spate of violence instigated by Hamas, timed, at least in part, to disrupt the wretched Eurovision Song Contest. I suppose Hamas was afraid that the Eurovision tourists would like the Zionist Entity and lose sympathy for the Palestinian cause. (I think that’s already happening, according to one enthusiastic Tweet I saw this morning.)

In this latest battle, the death score is a little less ‘disproportionate’ than is necessary to satisfy the hostile media. That unforgettable “How many Israelis?” interview by scrapey-voiced school-mistress Mishal Husain is forever etched on our (my) memory. 

John Humphrys introduced the item, pointedly using the term “militants’ twice. (Palestinian Militants and Gaza Militants) He then announced that he would be talking to “Islam Hamad, he’s on the steering committee of what is called the Great Return March”  (He definitely used the name “Islam” this time, though he corrected it later, perhaps prompted via the headphones) and he fluffed the description of the other guest’s professional role so awkwardly and confusingly that listeners might still be wondering who Michael Oren is.  Some kind of Israeli Ambassador to the United States, you know, something like that.

At the end of his opening statement, Oren suggested that when the time is right, Israel will probably  “do more to rid Gaza of Hamas.”

Humphrys asked Issam (Essam) (from Hamas) whether he  “wants to see Gaza rid of Hamas.” 

“Aah, Hamas is a freedom fighter” he replied, “It is fighting for freedom. If we are not under occupation there would be no Hamas.” 

Everyone knows that Gaza hasn’t been under occupation since 2005. But Issam doesn’t mean that. He means “Palestine” is under occupation. That’s ‘Israel’, to you and me. He is quite explicit about this, as he refers to the effect the rocket barrage (Schools shut down, weddings and football matches cancelled etc) which Oren has just described, but he (Issam) calls it “Southern  Palestine” and compares it with his own people’s situation, (i.e., similarly incapacitated, but of course entirely as a consequence of  their own decision to instigate the rocket-firing.) 

He says that if the Palestinians achieved their “right of return” there would be peace. (But obviously no Jewish state.) Humphrys missed that. Not being alert to the fundamental problem, he goes on to make a much more simplistic argument, which roughly amounts to “War bad; why not negotiate?” 

IH

“We’ve been negotiating through Egypt. We want Israel not to shoot at the peaceful protesters who are peacefully protesting on the Great Return March. Human Rights Watch says Israel is committing war crimes” […] ” Israel wants to kick out all the Palestinians; if they don’t want to do this they wouldn’t pass the law that Israel is the Jewish State…”

JH

“And Dr Oren, many people will hear what Mr Hamad has said and will agree with him and say yes, Israel is entirely intransigent”

MO

“If they agree with him they know nothing of the facts. Hamas is an Islamist, Jihadist organisation. It’s a terrorist organisation…

JH

“And it exists because of the occupation”

Ron Proser would have eaten them both up for lunch.

The Voice

Here, I give up. I just give up. 

Must Read

I’ve been “away from the office” recently, but I have to mention two outstanding ‘must-reads’.

The first has already been highlighted by Elder and BBC Watch, and has, no doubt, already been devoured by anyone who is concerned about the BBC’s damaging portrayal of Israel. It’s another media related tour de force by Matti Friedman, who pleased many frustrated BBC watchers with his earlier piece  “An Insider’s Guide to the Most Important Story on Earth” August 2014, Tablet magazine. We wrote about it here.

In Friedman’s latest article, published in The Atlantic is titled “What the Media gets Wrong About Israel” he reiterates some of the points he made previously. The disproportionate media attention devoted to this conflict relative to other stories, the grossly oversimplified, distorted story it creates, and the telling lack of editorial interest in anything that would interfere with it.

He expands on what we might call ‘confirmation bias’. A toxic mix of assorted transient, ‘here today gone tomorrow’ reporters, all of whom are expected to assimilate or ‘acculturate’ instantly, from day one, when they arrive in an unfamiliar situation, falling straight into the arms of the welcoming, closed-world media social circle that has ties with pro Palestinian NGOs, humanitarian agencies, ‘numerous’ arms of the UN, left wing Israeli ‘peace‘ activists,  staffers and stringers from the PA. 

“This provides them not only with sources and friendships but with a ready-made framework for their reporting—the tools to distill and warp complex events into a simple narrative in which there is a bad guy who doesn’t want peace and a good guy who does. This is the “Israel story,” and it has the advantage of being an easy story to report.”

“In these circles, in my experience, a distaste for Israel has come to be something between an acceptable prejudice and a prerequisite for entry.”

Hamas’s understanding and manipulation of the press’s default narrative  -  Israel as the oppressor and the Palestinians as passive victims  - herds the media towards acting as an unwitting conduit for Hamas propaganda. Hamas will engineer faux ‘confessions’ of tolerance and soft-heartedness, which the press presents as a ‘scoop’. “The Muslim Brotherhood is Actually Liberal” and so on. Now, where have we heard that before, Mr. Bowen?

He explains how concealing the ubiquity of “other reporters” is necessary to maintain the illusion. The truth would reveal Hamas’s strategy of deliberately attacking from behind Palestinian civilians, drawing Israeli response and having the press on hand to film the resultant Palestinian casualties “with the understanding that the resulting outrage abroad will blunt Israel’s response.” 

Hamas’s ruthless M.O. is predicated on the cooperation of journalists.

“Hamas understood that journalists would not only accept as fact the Hamas-reported civilian death toll—relayed through the UN or through something called the “Gaza Health Ministry,” an office controlled by Hamas—but would make those numbers the center of coverage. Hamas understood that reporters could be intimidated when necessary and that they would not report the intimidation;”

It seems that the BBC insisted at the time that the UN figures were reliable; will the BBC acknowledge that this is not the case?

The btl comments at The Atlantic consist of bickering between pro and anti-Israel keyboard warriors. The fantasies used by the antis to defend the media and justify their impenetrable anti-Israel advocacy is based on a combo of staggering ignorance and uncritical and wholehearted acceptance of Palestinian Islamist rhetoric not to mention antisemitic propaganda.

To counter that, or some may say to stoop to their level, I’d venture to offer this somewhat extreme piece of prose by Sebastian Vilar Rodrigez, linked to by a defender of the article.  A bit racist, a bit bigoted, but with more than a grain of truth.

The second tour de force is Ambassador Ron Proser’s speech at the UN. Go to Daphne Anson to read the transcript, which is even better than the video, which you can also watch here!

Here are elementary truths that the Israel-bashing brigade find so unpalatable that they simply refuse to listen to them.