Shocker: BBC Admits Reporter’s Anti-Israel Bias
April 21 was Holocaust Day in Israel. I have to admit to a degree of schadenfreude as a result of a ruling in that same week by the BBC Trust that its chief Middle East correspondent, Jeremy Bowen, showed bias in a piece about the Six-Day War. I have felt for years that Bowen has a disturbing, almost hissing hatred of Israel when he reports on the region. He always waxes into a cooing adoration when in Palestinian hands. To this day Bowen has not responded to my letter about his BBC documentary on the IDF’s ground invasion of Gaza: I asked him how he managed to find graffiti in house after house, always conveniently written in English by Israeli soldiers!
Of course, the Israel-bashing Independent correspondent Robert Fisk went into a paroxysm of rage as soon as the BBC Trust report was issued and the ensuing blog contained so much Jew-hatred that I was minded to report it to the Community Security Trust. What was so interesting was Fisk’s hysterical accusation that the “Zionist lobby” had bullied the BBC. He concluded that the British nation could now no longer trust the BBC because even the impartial Auntie Beeb is now in the bloody grips of the Zionist shark’s jaw.
To quote Fisk, “The BBC Trust is now a mouthpiece for the Israeli lobby which abused Bowen.” He goes on: “Anyone who has read the history of Zionism will be aware that its aim was to dispossess the Arabs and take over Palestine. Why else are Zionists continuing to steal Arab land for Jews, and Jews only, against all international law?” He adds this gem: “The fact that the BBC Trust uses the Hebrew name for Har Homa — not the original Arab name, Jebel Abu Ghoneim — shows just how far it is now a mouthpiece for the Israeli lobby.” Whenever I read about the huge, vociferous Israel lobby in the UK I do laugh: the pitifully small Anglo-Jewish community is one of the least “loud” in the world. It is important that this article names the “Zionist-driven” Trust members. They are Rotha Johnston, Chitra Bharucha, Janet Lewis-Jones, Diane Coyle, David Liddiment, Anthony Fry, Mehmuda Mian, Alison Hastings, Jeremy Peat, Patricia Hodgson, Richard Tait, and Sir Michael Lyons.
I have done some research before mouthing off about “no Zionist connections,” but despite the usual accusations in the press it is tough to find any sinister motives amongst this distinguished and diverse board of trustees.
What makes Fisk so angry is that he feels Bowen wrote a truthful piece about the Six-Day War for the BBC website and that he is a “lion led by BBC donkeys.” In his report Bowen alluded to “Zionism’s innate instinct to push out the frontier” and opined that Israel showed a “defiance of everyone’s interpretation of international law except its own.”
The BBC has always been anti-semitic, ask anyone that works there! Its like that because its full of Lefties who have no moral compass. They see the Arabs as a third world underdog oppressed by Western imperialist colonialist invaders, when the opposite is the truth. Thier hatred of the Jew is greater than their loathing of the killing of gays, the oppression and honour killing or women, or even the military training and arming of children.
For the BBC history began in 1948, not 1917 or 1919 or 1922 when real International Law was created. Their ignorance is displayed when they parrot chapter 6 resolutions as International Law, which they are not!
What the BBC conveniently forgets is that Britain teamed up with Israel to invade Egypt when Nasser nationalized the Suez Canal, a British possession, back in 1956. How hypocritical can the BBC get? as bad as the tax it imposes upon the British public for its own support.
Thanks Carol for reminding me why I refused to pay my “BBC bill.”
It’s time to vote with your feet. If you don’t love Israel, if you are antisemitic or believe that Israel isn’t the homeland of the Jewish people, then Join the boycott! Do it today.
DoubleTapper
DoubleTapper@gmail.com
DoubleTapper, blogging on Guns Politics Defense from Israel
The British know they’re paying taxes to support BBC. Americans often forget. Action should be taken to remove BBC programming from publicly funded stations here in the US.
Well done Ms Gould! The entire BBC is biased, not just the objectionable Mr Bowen and their own internal enquiry proved it – although they refused to publish it after spending 200,000 pounds! (The Balen Report)
Their bias is even more incidious than it first appears since they have succeeded in convincing an entire nation that the victim is the instigator of violence. Shame on them!!!
I think actor John Malkovich had the definitive statement on Robert Fisk.
Hard to improve on it.
However, it does lead me to a fairly obvious question:
If so many people in the UK hate the BBC, why doesn’t someone organize a boycott of the license fee, and be willing to publicly go to jail for it?
The Chief Rabbi is too much of a wimp to do that; but might there be some prominent Tory politician or conservative journalist (Melanie Phillips, Stephen Pollard, Richard Littlejohn and Peter Hitchens all come to this American mind) willing to risk it?
And Carol, if not them, what about you?
Or you can turn leftie weapons against them and sue them for willful promotion of hatred. Words have consequences. Enough is enough don’t you think?
Every time I see an employee list from the BBC (or credits on who produced/wrote programs), it seems like a huge percentage of the names are Arabic. No wonder they’re anti-Semitic, but one has to wonder what kind of hiring program is in place for them to end up with *sooooooo* many Arabs on their staff.
That letter at the end was an epic pwn of the entire anti-Israel movement
It’s not just the BBC that is virulently anti-semitic; all of Europe is so and has been so for centuries. Post WWII Europe did not “see the light” and become largely tolerant of Jews. Rather, they stopped being PUBLIC anti-semites and became CLOSET anti-semites. All the same biases, prejudices and insults are bandied around when groups who trust each other get together. Let the topic of Israel or Jews come up at a small dinner or cocktail party and if no one reacts, the flood gates will open and all manner of hateful vitriol will pour forth! This is true in Germany (of course), but also anywhere from Austria to Norway and including all of Britain. None are above the name, Anti-Semite.
Yes, this is painting with a broad brush. Yes, there are many individuals who are definitely NOT Anti-Semites and who ARE sympathetic to Israel. But that’s not new; there have always been those who stood against the tide. But the ugly truth is that there is little difference in modern Europe from pre-WWII Europe with regard to common attituedes regarding Jews.
The Muslim world is a diseased old man wasting his last days railing against his condition and blaming his neighbors for his failures. And right there at his heels, barking furiously in unison with him is Europe, his always-faithful, mangy and toothless mongrel.
I think it would be great if the Zionists took over the BBC, the Islamists have been running it for years.
Turnabout is fair play.
Jeremy Bowen may not be an anti-Semite…
He is, though, and he’s not the only BBC “reporter” that is – think of Orla Goebbels (Guerin) or Barbara “weep for Arafat” Plett, fortunately now shipped off to Afghanistan and Africa.
The BBC is not monolithic, and there are some excellent documentaries, including “Six Days that Changed the World” on the six day war. But the place is infected with leftist antisemitism, these days more common that right-wing antisemitism. Jobs are advertised in the Guardian, which says it all.
I believe the BBC even produced a report which found news coverage to be biased against Israel, then conveniently suppressed it. A fight is on in the courts to get it released. If it tells only a small part of the truth, that will be a start.
Carol,
The USA is ready to ignominiously throw the Jews of Israel under the bus too. Depressing.
The BBC is run by the Guardian reading classes for an audience that reads the Daily Mail & the Daily Telegraph. We know that it is biased but are wary of throwing the baby out with the bath water. After all, most of us in the UK read a daily newspaper. We know that they all have their axes to grind and keep that in mind when we read them. The BBC is institutionally biased in favour of socialism. So, in the case of the USA, they will always favour the Democrats. They don’t like the USA because it shows you can do quite well without being socialist. They have a major problem because socialism doesn’t work. In the end, their bias is counter-productive, because people don’t believe anything they say and often just stop listening. Our current government is just the same – no one believes a word they say.
There is a new front to the war against Israel. It is an economic front. The new tactic is to get European governments, and Europeans to boycott Israeli products. Norway has just capitulated to this scheme and has authorized the labeling of any Israeli products with a special sticker. In all fairness, Norwegian products should be boycotted, their consulates and embassies notified why. Turn-about is fair play.
PLEASE BOYCOTT ALL NORWEGIAN PRODUCTS AND LET NORWAY KNOW WHY.
There is a fantastic blog which documents the relentless left wing bias of the BBC on a daily basis, much of it anti-Israel and antisemitic.
http://biased-bbc.blogspot.com/
“In all fairness, Norwegian products should be boycotted”
Both of them??
Harry
They sell lots of sardines and lox in this country. If we started looking we would find some more. Their GDP isn’t that big, any boycott would hurt them and fast.
now this is a shocker. could it be these liberal leftists r beginning to grow a spine and a conscious