- Tim Llewellyn The Guardian
I covered the Middle East for the BBC from the mid-1970s to the early 1990s, and am aggrieved by my ex-employer's continuing inability to describe in a just and contextualised way the conflict between military occupier and militarily occupied. There is no attempt to properly convey cause and effect, to report the misery, violence and pillage that demean and deny freedom to the Palestinians and provoke their (limited) actions.
Greg Philo and Mike Berry, in their book More Bad News from Israel, prove by textual analysis and follow-up interviews with viewers and listeners that I am right – and so are an increasing number of people who are becoming aware that the BBC sells them short on Israel. Philo and Berry's book, an updated edition of Bad News From Israel (2004), examines coverage of the Israeli blitz on Gaza, analysing BBC TV and ITV early evening bulletins between its beginning on 27 December 2008, and the ceasefire on 17 January 2009.
(Thanks Jemmy)
This morning I listened to a long, long kvetch on the BBC by the Israeli ambassador to the UK about the lack of free speech in British universities. It seems that students shout him down all the time.
ReplyDeleteI expect the BBC, in the name of its much vaunted 'balance' will now be giving some opponent of apartheid and ethnic cleansing the chance to explain why Ambassador Prossor is having so much trouble.
(I don't really.)
Must be Jemmy, right?
ReplyDeleteThe same. I keep forgetting to type in my name. Still, being a 'guest' makes me feel like I've been invited somewhere.
ReplyDeleteHere's the Prosor (not Prossor) spiel -
ReplyDeletehttp://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/today/newsid_9503000/9503666.stm
The interviewer is John Humphrys. He has a reputation for giving politicians a tough time. Sometimes he is accused of going too far, not allowing them to finish a sentence. I guess he must have fallen asleep listening to this nudnik. Or he has been warned off by those who must be obeyed.