The BBC’s ‘Bogeyman’ Narrative on Hugo Chavez
News Unspun | March 7, 2013
The BBC maintained a strong a record of misleading reporting throughout the presidency of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, who died on Tuesday, following a two year battle with cancer. Yet today’s article by Jon Kelly, ‘Hugo Chavez and the era of anti-American bogeymen,’ takes a particularly spiteful slant on the issue of what is presented as ‘Anti-Americanism’ in Chavez’s stance toward US foreign policy.
The premise of Kelly’s analysis is that Hugo Chavez is simply the latest in a long list of ‘bogeymen’, identified by ‘anti-American’ sentiment. To illustrate the ideological company that Kelly suggests Chavez kept, his image appears on the same panel as murderous despots and terrorists such as Saddam Hussein, Muammar Gaddafi and Osama bin Laden. This may have been normal practice for news organisations such as Fox News, but for the BBC it must be noted that this is a move particularly devoid of integrity, perhaps a new low.
Kelly writes that Chavez was by turns ‘portrayed as a six-times elected champion of the people or a constitution-fiddling demagogue’, implying that the polarisation of commentary concerning Chavez’s presidency makes it difficult to perceive where the truth lies. Perhaps if Kelly had indulged in the journalistic habit of presenting the bare facts, it might help to dispel such confusion. It is factually accurate to acknowledge that Hugo Chavez was democratically elected six times, also that his base of support was amongst the poor, the vast majority of Venezuelans. The ambiguous claim of ‘constitution-fiddling’ is in line with the speculative approach the BBC has consistently leaned towards in reporting on Venezuelan politics, relying on the hyperbole of the opposition, yet lacking in facts (in a similar vein, the link to the BBC video on Hugo Chavez’s life on the BBC website has been updated and is now titled ‘Life of people’s hero and villain’).
In discussing US-Venezuelan relations, Kelly does not mention probably the most seminal event of the last fourteen years: the US-backed coup in 2002. As an interesting aside, straight after the death of Hugo Chavez, in the BBC ‘look back’ at his life, the coup was also omitted by James Robbins, who instead described events as ‘a general strike’ when ‘Chavez was briefly pushed from office’.
Kelly creates a ‘spectrum’ of ‘bogeymen’ with ‘anti-American’ tendencies: socialism to secular Arab nationalism to Islamic fundamentalism. The article ties together the homogenously applied label ‘anti-American’ and the term ‘bogeymen’ to somehow equate the two: if you don’t like the behaviour of the US this mode of reasoning renders you no less than a bogeyman, an object of fear and a threat. Kelly comments that where Hugo Chavez belonged on this spectrum was hotly debated. He presents as indisputable the claim that Chavez should be viewed as a ‘bogeyman’; it is only where he sits in relation to other bogeymen that is up for debate.
The article notes that Chavez ‘floridly lambasted “imperial” American policies’, the word ‘imperial’ placed in double quotes, and the notion that the most powerful country in the world with 900 military bases in 130 countries might have imperialist tendencies portrayed as ludicrous. In fact, the BBC never refer to US imperialism without quotation marks; imperialism is a word for history books it seems, today’s western militaries simply invade countries for the greater good. Those who think the US is an imperial power are simply ‘anti-American’ goes the gist of this article.
Anti-American
The term anti-American is one applied to negate critical positions on the policies of the US. Noam Chomsky has commented on the term ‘anti-American’ that it ‘is an interesting expression, because the accusation of being anti-nation is used typically in totalitarian societies, for example, the former Soviet Union accused dissidents of being anti-Soviet. But try “anti-Italian” or “anti-Belgian,” people in Milan or Brussels would laugh’.
By this tendency to apply one label to a range of political viewpoints, Hugo Chavez joins the ranks of the ‘most prominent critics’ of US power have recently ‘exited the spotlight’. The implication here is clear: Osama bin Laden, Saddam Hussein, Muammar Gaddafi, and Kim Jong-il have been prominent critics of the US, and if anyone happens to disagree with the US, they are in the same boat. All who do not ‘agree’ with the United States, including disagreement with any and all elements of US foreign policy, are designated to one ideological grouping. Naomi Klein discusses how this approach was taken by critics of anti-corporate protesters following September 11, 2001, who ‘attempt to make ideological links between anti-corporate protesters and religious fundamentalists like bin Laden, as British secretary of State for international development Clare Short did in November 2001. “Since September 11, we haven’t heard from the protesters,” she observed. “I’m sure they are reflecting on what their demands were because their demands turned out to be very similar to those of Bin Laden’s network.”’
The attempt to place a range of political positions in one or another camp (‘us’ or ‘theirs’) works to deter dissent. ‘To engage in dissent in this climate [following September 11] was unpatriotic’, as Klein writes. ‘The new battle lines have been drawn, crude as they are: to criticize the U.S. government is to be on the side of the terrorists, to stand in the way of market-driven globalization is to further the terrorists’ evil goals’.
This is precisely the position propagated by the Bush administration at the launch of the ‘war on terror’, ‘the binarism that Bush proposes’, as Judith Butler described, ‘in which only two positions are possible – “Either you’re with us or you’re with the terrorists”’. Liberally applying the label ‘anti-American bogeyman’ on the basis of a divergence of position with US policy, as Kelly does, is consistent with this position of binarism.
The BBC claims to take an impartial stance on international issues, yet this article propagates a worldview in black and white terms. In this presentation of political positions as a choice between only two options, that of the US and the political ideology of free market are presented or that of the despotic and terroristic bogeyman.
It is important that the events which have taken place in Venezuela, and throughout Latin America, over the past decade, the development of peaceful, democratic alternatives to the policies of neoliberalism, are not airbrushed from the historical record. The standards of living have improved for millions of people following a process that has had popular, democratic support, yet the international perception of the changes in Venezuela are at risk of being written off as simply the actions of another ‘anti-American’ ‘bogeyman’ due to the media’s relentless negative treatment of the Venezuelan government.
BBC Censors Video Showing Syrian Rebels Forcing Prisoner to Become Suicide Bomber
By Paul Joseph Watson | Infowars | August 23, 2012
The BBC has sensationally censored a news story and a video showing Syrian rebels forcing a prisoner to become a suicide bomber, a war crime under the Geneva Conventions, presumably because it reflected badly on establishment media efforts to portray the FSA as glorious freedom fighters.
The video, a copy of which can be viewed above (the original BBC version was deleted), shows Free Syrian Army rebels preparing a bomb that is loaded onto the back of a truck to be detonated at a government checkpoint in the city of Aleppo.
The clip explains how the rebels have commandeered an apartment belonging to a Syrian police captain. The rebels are seen sneering at photos of the police captain’s family while they proclaim, “Look at their freedom, look how good it is,” while hypocritically enjoying the luxury of the man’s swimming pool.
The video then shows a prisoner who the rebels claim belonged to a pro-government militia. Bruises from torture on the prisoner’s body are explained away as having been metered out by the man’s previous captors. The BBC commentary emphasizes how well the rebels are treating the man, showing them handing him a cigarette.
However, the man has been tricked into thinking he is part of a prisoner exchange program when in reality he is being set up as an unwitting suicide bomber. The prisoner is blindfolded and told to drive the truck towards a government checkpoint.
“What he doesn’t know is that the truck is the one that’s been rigged with a 300 kilo bomb,” states the narrator.
The clip then shows rebels returning disappointed after it’s revealed that the remote detonator failed and the bomb did not explode.
The BBC narrator admits that forcing prisoners to become suicide bombers “would certainly be considered a war crime.”
New York Times reporters who shot the video claim they had no knowledge of the plot. A longer version of the clip is posted on the New York Times You Tube channel. The title of the clip glorifies the rebel fighters as “The Lions of Tawhid”.
Within hours of the story being published, it was subsequently sent down the memory by the BBC. Attempts to reach the original article URL are greeted with a 404 Not Found page.
In addition, a You Tube version of the same video originally posted on the official BBC News 2012 channel was also removed. Although the You Tube page for the video states that it was removed after a “copyright claim by British Broadcasting Corporation” this is a bogus reason, because the video was not uploaded by a third party, it was posted on the official BBC channel, as the screenshot below proves.
“Copyright claim” is a bogus reason for the video’s removal because it originally appeared on the official BBC News Channel, and was not uploaded by a third party.
It seems clear that the only reason for the video to be removed would be because senior BBC news editors felt the story reflected badly on the propaganda campaign to characterize the Syrian rebels as venerable and proud freedom fighters, when in reality as we have documented they have been guilty of massacres, kidnappings, torture and other acts of brutality.
This represents a clear effort to hide evidence of Syrian rebels, who the Obama administration recently pledged to support with taxpayer dollars, engaged in war crimes.
In addition, the fact that the rebels, under the direction of Al-Qaeda fighters, are building bombs and carrying out terrorist attacks is something the NATO-aligned media is keen not to emphasize.
This is by no means the first time the BBC has been caught manipulating the news in an effort to propagandize for western military involvement in Syria.
Back in May we exposed how the BBC has used a years-old photo of dead Iraqi children to depict victims of an alleged government assault in the town of Houla.
The photographer who took the original picture, Marco Di Lauro, posted on his Facebook page, “Somebody is using my images as a propaganda against the Syrian government to prove the massacre.” Di Lauro told the London Telegraph he was “astonished” the BBC had failed to check to authenticity of the image.
Should the copy at the top of this article also be deleted, an alternate version of the BBC video with added commentary under fair use is embedded below.
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The media and nuclear weapons: spot the difference between Britain and Iran
News Unspun | June 18, 2012
Over the last 7 months, UK journalists have consistently voiced their objection to nuclear weapons proliferation. This opposition appears as the western media holds a magnifying glass to Iran and speculation abounds over Iran’s nuclear capabilities; speculation that appears to be more in line with western governments’ policy rather than with any real evidence. Bloggers at the Telegraph are so against the proliferation of nuclear weapons that Con Coughlin called in November 2011 for ‘Barack Obama to act’ against Iran, and Dan Hodges called for the creation of a ‘Start the War Coalition‘ to stop Iran from potentially developing a nuclear bomb.
The BBC has shown similar concern. On 27 November 2011 it reported that an IAEA report suggested that ‘Iran was working towards acquiring a nuclear weapon’, even though the report said no such thing. Three days later, Jon Simpson described Iran as ‘a country that doesn’t play by the rules – a country that seems close to having a nuclear bomb’.
Throughout 2012, Julian Borger, the security correspondent at the Guardian, has been examining reports from the Washington think-tank ISIS, mainstreaming the speculation (rather than evidence) that Iran might be developing a nuclear bomb at a military site in Parchin in his Guardian ‘Security Blog’.
Journalists are so concerned, in fact, that they seem unable to bring themselves to challenge UK politicians’ outright fabrications about Iran’s nuclear programme. So, George Osborne went unchallenged when he spoke to the BBC about ‘the development of Iran’s weaponised military nuclear weapon programme’, while Liam Fox (former Defence Secretary of a nuclear state) faced no objection when he told the Today show’s James Naughtie that ‘obviously, Iran is a nuclear weapon state’. A Guardian headline even read: “Iran ‘seeking to build nuclear weapons’, warns David Cameron” (a statement based on ‘intelligence’) – a headline that no doubt reminded many of Blair’s 2003 claims about Iraq.
Considering this unified and overwhelming concern for potential nuclear weapons development, how do the UK news providers react when the UK, another signatory of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), announces another step in continued noncompliance with the treaty with ‘a £1bn contract for reactors for the next generation of the UK’s nuclear-armed submarines’?
What are the priorities for discussion in reporting on moves toward the UK’s renewal of its nuclear weapons system, in direct contravention of the NPT? Will the UK be called out as ‘a country that doesn’t play by the rules’?
Article VI of the NPT states that:
Each of the Parties to the Treaty undertakes to pursue negotiations in good faith on effective measures relating to cessation of the nuclear arms race at an early date and to nuclear disarmament
As such, one consideration might be the continued disregard of this article, as manifest in the UK’s policies. Journalists now have it handed to them on a plate: a country with an enormous military budget which has invaded and bombed a number of countries in the last decade (often regardless of international law) continues to brazenly flout the NPT. But instead this is reported rather positively, presented in such a way by the Ministry of Defence (MoD) to focus the emphasis on job creation and economic output.
The Telegraph report highlights the strong public opposition to the renewal of Trident, noting that ‘A poll two years ago found that 63% of the public said they supported scrapping Britain’s nuclear deterrent… ’ Against this opposition it seems must now be pitted the argument of job creation. The Telegraph quotes an ‘MoD source’ praising the plans as ‘a great boost for jobs’. Job creation appears a key point in both a BBC report and similar Press Association report on the deal, carried by the Guardian, which cite 300 jobs which will be created under the deal.
This is a standard argument for those in favour of the renewal of the Trident system. It is of the same line of reasoning that exalts the arms industry (that lucrative supplier of weaponry to repressive regimes) for its contribution to the economy. Taking their cue from the MoD, the Telegraph warns that ‘It is … claimed that failing to commission a new wave of submarines could cost up to 15,000 British jobs.’ This threat of a loss of employment is put forward in all seriousness, following a year in which more than a quarter of a million public workers lost their jobs following government cuts – something the Telegraph all but celebrates.
In this immediate coverage of the £1bn contract, priorities for discussion are limited to party politics (Lib Dem/Conservative fallout) and the implications for ‘British jobs’. The sham concern over the risks of nuclear proliferation when discussing Iran is in high contrast to the media’s portrayal of the UK’s nuclear ambitions, which relies heavily on the rhetoric of MoD sources while issues of the NPT and nuclear disarmament go unmentioned.
Related articles
- U.S. Sides With Israel’s Nukes Over Iran’s Lack Thereof (alethonews.wordpress.com)
- Hillary distinguishes Israel from Iran in NPT (thehindu.com)
- Iran’s IAEA envoy: Britain and France violating NPT (EndtheLie.com)
BBC mistakenly [?] uses image of Iraq in Syrian massacre story
By Craig Silverman | Pointer. | May 28, 2012
A 2003 photo taken in Iraq was mistakenly used by the BBC website to illustrate a report about the recent massacre in Houla, Syria.
The Daily Telegraph reports that the image of a child jumping over body bags was removed from the story after the BBC realized its error. The photographer who took the shot is incredulous that the BBC could have confused his photo with recent events.
“I went home at 3am and I opened the BBC page, which had a front page story about what happened in Syria, and I almost felt off from my chair,” Marco di Lauro told the Telegraph. “One of my pictures from Iraq was used by the BBC web site as a front page illustration claiming that those were the bodies of yesterday’s massacre in Syria and that the picture was sent by an activist.”
The caption on the BBC image read, “This image – which cannot be independently verified – is believed to show the bodies of children in Houla awaiting burial.” The credit line on the image said, “Photo From Activist.”
Di Lauro posted on Facebook Sunday about the use of his image, and included this screenshot of the BBC website:
He made this statement in a Facebook post, which has since been shared over 750 times:
Somebody is using illegaly one of my images for anti syrian propaganda on the BBC web site front page
Today Sunday May 27 at 0700 am London time the attached image which I took in Al Mussayyib in Iraq on March 27, 2003 (see caption below) was front page on BBC web site illustrating the massacre that happen in Houla the Syrian town and the caption and the web site was stating that the images was showing the bodies of all the people that have been killed in the massacre and that the image was received by the BBC by an unknown activist. Somebody is using my images as a propaganda against the Syrian government to prove the massacre.
After being contacted by the Telegraph, a BBC spokesperson provided a statement. It reads in part:
We were aware of this image being widely circulated on the internet in the early hours of this morning following the most recent atrocities in Syria …
Efforts were made overnight to track down the original source of the image and when it was established the picture was inaccurate we removed it immediately.
The BBC has a very good team working at its User Generated Content Hub. They focus on sourcing and verifying content that surfaces on social media, or is sent in by activists or unofficial sources. An image of this nature that came from an activist would first go through the UGC Hub for verification. That’s what the group exists to do.
My guess is the UGC team failed to properly vet the image, or the image went live to the site before the UGC Hub had a chance to do its work. I contacted sources at the BBC but have not yet heard a definitive account of what happened.
~~~
A reverse image search could have flagged this photo in seconds. Where to do it? We use Google Image Search (instead of typing a search term in the text box select the camera icon which allows you to either enter the URL of an image or upload one) and Tineye (the process is the same).
Related articles
- Syrian government denies involvement in Houla massacre (alethonews.wordpress.com)
London sit-in to protest BBC neglect of prisoner’s hunger strike
Palestine Information Center – 17/05/2012
LONDON – Dozens of activists participated in a sit-in outside the BBC headquarters to protest the organization’s deliberate neglect of the Palestinian prisoners’ issue, and the constant bias in favor of the Zionist entity.
A number of solidarity organizations handed a protest letter to the BBC news administration, to protest its coverage of Palestinian issues, calling for an end to the BBC’s bias when it comes to covering news about Palestinians.
Zaher Al-Berawi, Spokesman for the Palestinian forum, told PIC that the BBC’s continued silence around this recent escalation of the Palestinian prisoners’ strike was not surprising especially that it prevents mentioning the word Palestine in its reports.
Berawi added that the BBC had refused previously to air an appeal for the Gazan people by the Disaster Emergency Committee (DEC), pointing out that this total bias to the Israeli occupation is a proof that it is influenced by the Zionist lobby that aims to convert it into a tool of the Israeli occupation through which they can get to the British public.
—
The protest letter handed to the BBC (Emphases added)
Dear Ms Boaden
For four weeks, during April and May, around 2,000 Palestinians held in Israeli jails were on hunger strike, protesting against Israel’s use of administrative detention, its policy of placing Palestinian prisoners in solitary confinement for years at a time, and the denial of family visits to inmates.
These prisoners joined others who had been refusing food since March 2012 and who, by the time a deal was reached on 14 May, were close to death.
This mass hunger strike, possibly the biggest in modern history, received minimal coverage on BBC Online and, until its final few days, none on BBC television and radio news.
During this time, the BBC gave prominent coverage to the hunger strike of Ukrainian politician Yulia Tymoshenko, and to Chinese dissident, Chen Guangcheng, yet ignored the 2,000 Palestinians on hunger strike, and the 27 Palestinian MPs imprisoned by Israel, some of whom were also refusing food.
The excuse given by the BBC during the third week of the Palestinian hunger strike for its failure in reporting was that its coverage was in line with other news organisations, citing, specifically, Al Jazeera.
We find it extraordinary and disturbing that the UK’s public-funded broadcaster should point to other news outlets, with the implication that it is content to follow rather than lead in covering world events, in an effort to distract from its own failings.
When BBC News at 10 did finally provide some coverage (11 May), close to four weeks after the mass hunger strike began, it did so without context, without reference to the prisoners’ demands, with no mention of the appalling health conditions, requiring hospitalisation, that many of the hunger strikers were suffering, and with absolutely no comment from a Palestinian spokesperson. Instead, the report by Kevin Connolly, featured Israeli government spokesperson, Mark Regev, speaking without challenge, comparing those who had taken the drastic step of engaging in a hunger strike to ‘suicide bombers’ and talking, falsely, about an ‘Islamist cause’.
His complete statement was: “It’s difficult when you’re dealing with someone who wants to commit suicide. It’s a problem with suicide bombers, who are prepared to blow themselves up when they want to kill innocent people, and in this tactic if they think for their Islamist cause if they want to kill themselves, it’s a challenge. We could not have as a precedent that every prisoner who goes on hunger strike, gets – to use a term from the game Monopoly – a get out of jail free card.”
This interview, which insulted and totally misrepresented the hunger strikers, was also used on News 24 and on Radio 4 news bulletins during 11 May. None of these reports were balanced with a Palestinian viewpoint, and the Israeli perspective of the hunger strikes was allowed to prevail on the BBC.
The BBC’s attitude towards the hunger strikes and its eventual, biased coverage is appalling in itself. It is also symptomatic of the BBC’s general attitude towards reporting on Palestine and the occupation and the tendency of BBC news programmes to tilt their coverage and analysis in favour of Israel.
It is, unfortunately, an attitude that cuts across the whole of the BBC, from the Director General and his refusal to broadcast a DEC appeal for Gaza to Radio 1Xtra and the censorship of the word ‘Palestine’ from an artist’s rap performance.
We would like to see an end to this bias against Palestine and news coverage from the region that is balanced, fair and reflective of the values of international law, rather than of the narrative provided by the dominant player in this struggle. It is the very least that licence-fee payers, who look to the BBC for honest information, deserve.
Yours sincerely
BBC survey: ‘Israel sinks in popularity’
Rehmat’s World | May 17, 2012
On May 10, the BBC released the results of its annual Global survey of world nations and how their influence is viewed by 24,090 participants from 27 nations. The participants were asked to rate the influence of each of 16 nations and the EU as “mostly positive” or “mostly negative”.
According to the survey – Germany received top positive views followed by Britain, Japan and Canada – while Iran received the highest negative views (55%, improved from last years’ 59%), followed by Pakistan (51%), North Korea (50%) and Israel (50%, up from 40% in 2010).
Among EU nations, Spain topped the negative opinion of Israel (74%), followed by Germany (69%), Britain (68%) and France (65%).
The United States, Nigeria and Kenya gave Israel more positive views than the rest of nations surveyed. In Canada, the negative ratings increased from 52% to 59% – while in Australia it went up from 58% to 65%. Israel received the highest negative opinion in Egypt (95%)and Turkey (73%).
The BBC survey paints a darker picture about Israel than the results of a survey conducted by the pro-Israel group, ADL, in March 2012. It revealed that a significant majority of Europeans believe that Jews are more loyal to Israel than the countries they live in.
Israel’s rise in unpopularity confirms Israel’s Reut Institute 2010 report – which warned the Netanyahu government of the ‘delegitimization’ of the Zionist entity.
“There are two main generators of attacks on Israel’s legitimacy. The Resistance Network – which operates on the basis of Islamist ideology and includes Iran, Hezbollah, and Hamas; and the Delegitimization Network – which operates in the international arena in order to negate Israel’s right to exist and includes individuals and organizations in the West, which are catalyzed by the radical left,” noted the report.
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Western Journalist: Visa Denied
By Sharmine Narwani | Al Akhbar | 2012-04-21
Item number five on UN Envoy Kofi Annan’s 6-point plan for Syria is the following:
“(5) Ensure freedom of movement throughout the country for journalists and a non-discriminatory visa policy for them.”
At a delicate moment in the hard-fought Syrian conflict that could potentially destabilize the entire Middle East, the United Nations believes getting more journalists into Syria is one of the six most urgent actions to consider?
Why? Are foreign reporters trained in special “observer” skills – with unique truth-detecting abilities bubble-wrapped in bullet and mortar-proof goop? And what will they see that Syrians – who know Syria best – cannot observe for themselves?
What the UN is really demanding – let’s be honest here – is for the Syrian government to open up the country to “Western” journalists. Yet, in all the conflicts covered in recent years, I cannot recall one that has been more badly covered by the mainstream western media than this Syrian crisis.
Almost to a person, western journalists are blaming their substandard coverage on the fact that they have been denied entry into Syria. And also – to a person – they seem to think that the world needs them there to understand what is going on inside the country.
Paul Conroy, the Sunday Times freelance cameraman who was injured by an explosive in Homs in February, tells the BBC’s Hard Talk that Syrians need their events verified by people like himself and his now-deceased colleague, war correspondent Marie Colvin, in order to be believed:
“It is a sad state of affairs that it does need people to go in… and actually be Western and be official journalists to make it real in the public eye.”
Is that like a Western-journalist-verification-stamp of some sort? Does it come with a guarantee – for accuracy in reporting?
Because, right now, I honestly cannot think of a group of people less capable of verifying things in Syria than western journalists. And it is not because they aren’t physically there or can’t string together more than two words in Arabic. It is largely because they feast at the trough of their own governments’ narratives on All Things. Western journalists are heady with a sense of righteousness leached from the oxymoronic “western values” shoved down our collective throats. Those same western values that demand “accountability” and “transparency” from all nations – while offering cover for western governments to hack their way through Muslim and Arab bodies in endless “national security” wars.
Do tell… Which major mainstream western media outlet has ever fundamentally questioned their government’s narratives on these wars? Which major western journalist risked career for truth on affairs related to the Middle East? Give me the name of that brave western network reporter who disrupts press conferences regularly with inconvenient questions on weapons sales to Gulf dictatorships – and has his bosses go to the wall to ensure he remains in the White House press pool. Show me the western reporter at the Washington Post, New York Times, CNN, BBC, France 24 who has made a career of doggedly questioning Israel’s disproportionate use of force against civilian populations – a journalist who sticks a microphone under Sarkozy, Obama or Cameron’s nose and bellows: “What fucking Peace Process are you chaps banging on about?”
No? Not one? Come on!
“No Syrian Visa” is just a convenient excuse for the lazy and sloppy reporting of western media in this Syrian conflict. It is a handy sound bite these days – one that quite deliberately ignores the Arab League Monitors’ January 2012 Report that 147 foreign and Arab media organizations were operating in Syria during their month-long observations.
“No Syrian Visa” tries hard to distract from the reality that most western journalists never actually go out to the front lines of conflict when filing their stories. Increasingly, reporters are sent out in organized pools by host governments – or in the case of recent US-initiated wars in the Middle East – by the invading armies.
“No Syrian Visa” selectively forgets that entering US-foe Syria as a journalist today is no more difficult than waltzing into US-ally Saudi Arabia – or US-ally Bahrain, when Formula One cars are not racing there.
And “No Syrian Visa” will blush hard when recalling that there was no similar collective western media outrage when the government of Israel declared “No Gaza Entry” as it pounded Palestinian populations in 2009.
Glossy Journalists Seek Content Not Facts
No. The problem with western reporters is that they are past their due date – remnants of an industry we once believed brandished standards of objectivity we never actually witnessed.
They are news-as-entertainment professionals – packaging glossy corporate content for maximum distribution and big bucks. The goal is not objective reportage. Their targets are quantifiable and highlighted in a business plan somewhere. Success is based on a simple formula: stay within parameters “understandable” to a wide audience that devours sound bites and familiar storylines on the hour, every hour. Like trained seals whose every desire, instinct and buying pattern has been measured by corporate media’s marketing department for the consumption of its advertisers, the audience demands satisfaction – and western media delivers it.
With the exception of a few proud holdouts, western media has made a beeline for the sexy story in Syria – which is essentially the fairytale of the “Arab Spring” with a little twist: Bad regime, good activists – but kick out this dictator and it’s a three-for-one, with Iran and Hezbollah tossed in as a bonus.
There are only three guiding rules for most western journalists inside or outside of Syria: 1) only quote anti-regime populations, 2) do not seek out independent domestic opposition figures, 3) evidence is unimportant, as long as you loosely “source” it:
They head straight for the Syrian activist, the anti-regime demonstration, the man with the gun in a “hot spot.” These are one side of the Syrian story, for sure. But you will not find mainstream western journalism broadcasting a pro-regime rally of tens of thousands, the national flag painted on the faces of Assad supporters – young and old – waving posters of their president. Pro-regime Syrians, a majority of whom voted in a national referendum in February to adopt constitutional reforms, are never interviewed by these reporters.
You will not find western journalists side-stepping the NATO-friendly Syrian National Council (SNC) “opposition” to interview the dozens of domestic Syrian opposition figures – most who have spent years in regime prisons – but who also unanimously reject the militarization and internationalization of the conflict; i.e., “non-Syrians butt out.”
And most importantly, you will never find mainstream western journalism seeking out “evidence” to support the false narratives of their governments. Who is included in the daily death count reported around the world? Who has killed thousands of Syrian soldiers? Who is killing children in Syria? Who is killing journalists in Syria? Who stands to gain from these deaths? Who stands to gain from this video footage or still photo emailed to my desktop? How do I know that plume of smoke was caused by a regime mortar? Who is the sniper? Why do so many Syrians still support Bashar al-Assad?
Propaganda As a Weapon of War
The “Big Lie” is a propaganda technique used liberally by western governments in the Middle East. The Big Lie refers to “the repeated articulation of a complex of events that justify subsequent action. The descriptions of these events have elements of truth, and the Big Lie generalizations merge and eventually supplant the public’s accurate perception of the underlying events.”
Using Big Lie techniques in the Middle East are particularly easy because western media is so happily complicit in propagating one-dimensional stereotypes of Arabs and Muslims. These assumptions are programmed so deeply, that even after months of watching on our TV screens disparate populations of all backgrounds and political convictions rally to reshape their governing systems… we still see regional events only through the prism of a one-size-fits-all Arab Spring.
The US Military’s Special Forces Unconventional Warfare manual describes ways to overthrow a government outside of a conventional combat format. In a section headlined Will of the Population, the manual explains ways to overcome popular support for the existing national government and alter natural hostility to foreign intervention:
“Information activities that increase dissatisfaction with the hostile regime or occupier and portray the resistance as a viable alternative are important components of the resistance effort. These activities can increase support for the resistance through persuasive messages that generate sympathy among populations.”
The manual expounds on this in another area:
“The USG (US Government) begins to shape the target environment as far in advance as possible. The shaping effort may include operations to increase the legitimacy of U.S. operations and the resistance movement, building internal and external support for the movement, and setting conditions for the introduction of U.S. forces. … The population of a recently occupied country may already be psychologically ready to accept U.S. sponsorship, particularly if the country was a U.S. ally before its occupation. In other cases, psychological preparation may require a protracted period before yielding any favorable results.”
The Syrian crisis is not about reforms any longer – it has become a geopolitical battle for influence in the Middle East, with NATO, the GCC and BRIC nations taking sides. Western media fails to address this larger picture, so glaringly obvious to people in the region. Instead it focuses almost entirely on the “David vs Goliath” or “good vs evil” themes that appeal to a broad audience of dumbed-down media consumers. These populations in turn become perception “leaders” when they back foreign military adventures in opinion polls broadcast back to us by – you guessed it – western media. And in that neat trick, your western government checks off a tick-box called “citizen approval.”
But Syrians have approved no such thing. More than a year after the first anti-government protests – which have never grown into the hundreds of thousands and millions experienced elsewhere in the region – Syrians have not ejected their leader, nor is there any evidence that the majority of Syrians wish to do so. The constitutional referendum in February, which a small majority of Syrians approved in an excellent turnout, should have been some indication for the media that popular sentiment is not necessarily reflected in an unverifiable cellphone image.
The daily casualty statistics coming out of Syria are deliberately misrepresented as regime “kills,” satellite photos of alleged regime shelling contradict the dominant narratives, activists faking events begs the question “why would they need to falsify evidence if the regime is so brutal?” But western media hears and sees nothing that doesn’t suit their formulaic narrative.
There is no better example of how mentally embedded western media has become with the Syrian “opposition” (itself a very broad and mixed bag), than a recent incident with CNN in Homs. Correspondent Arwa Damon and her non-Arab crew were tipped off about a potential pipeline explosion, so they pre-positioned their camera in a window frame facing the exact location of the anticipated bombing. When the pipeline explodes some time later, Damon and her crew look exultant – almost drunk on their success. Scoop? Try complicity in an act of terrorism. Can you imagine them doing this if the target was an American installation in Iraq or a NATO depot in Afghanistan? They would never live it down.
Reality Check
A year after the first small protests in Syria, the Syrian government stands strong, bolstered by its many constituencies, and spared the mass defections experienced by other Arab leaders. It appears that propaganda is not enough to shake the foundations of all Arab states. Now is the time for western media to ask why they got it so wrong. And some are indeed questioning their information, sources and assumptions.
There are western journalists who are doing a more than creditable job of writing about Syria from outside the country – the Independent’s Patrick Cockburn and The Guardian’s Seumas Milne come to mind. Please feel free to list other responsible, professional western journalists in the comments section below – I am sure we all want to celebrate their courage and increase their page views.
As for the others, their arrogance and cowardice is dangerous. False narratives have emboldened Syrians and other regional actors to act incautiously, angrily, even euphorically, when they might have benefited from nuance and calculation. People have died in the spinning of this conflict.
It is clearly time to challenge the dated concept that mainstream western media is impartial, objective or professional in their coverage of Mideast affairs. But we shouldn’t just bemoan this injustice in yet another stream of impotent essays and editorials. We must drag this industry of disinformation into the public arena, and make them accountable throughout the region by acting to affect ratings and readership.
Kofi Annan needs to immediately drop item number 5 on his Syria plan. While freedom of speech is important to uphold – even more so in times of strife – today, mainstream western journalism is nothing more than another face of the “external intervention” he so gravely warns against. Toss those western journos out of Syria unless they can demonstrate independent, objective, responsible reporting of this conflict. False narratives are costing Arab and Muslim lives. And media “combatants” need not apply to practice their craft in this region any longer.
Sharmine Narwani is a commentary writer and political analyst covering the Middle East. You can follow Sharmine on twitter @snarwani.
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Israeli rabbi says ‘kill everyone in Gaza, including babies’
The Cradle | March 24, 2024
Rabbi Eliyahu Mali, head of the Shirat Moshe yeshiva (religious school) in the occupied city of Jaffa, called on the Israeli army to kill everyone in Gaza, including babies.
During a conference on 8 March, Mali said that “according to the halachic principle (a religious-ethical system of legal reasoning in Judaism), all residents of Gaza must be killed.”
When asked during the conference if babies should be killed as well, he said: “The same thing. You can’t be clever with the Torah. Today he’s a baby, tomorrow he’s a fighter. There are no questions here. Today’s terrorists were previously 8-year-old children.”
“Those who create the terrorists” should also be killed, he said in reference to women in Gaza.
The Rabbi went on to explain that Israel’s war on Gaza is a “Mitzvah war,” which is defined as a war of “commandment” in Jewish tradition. According to Jewish law, this kind of war does not require permission from a “Sanhedrin,” also known as a council or assembly, such as the war against Amalek – previously declared in a biblical reference by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the start of the war on Gaza.
“There is a difference between a civilian population in other places and a civilian population in Gaza. In Gaza, according to estimates, 95 to 98 percent want us destroyed.”
“Since this is a sensitive issue, and I was told that it is being uploaded on the Internet, I want to be ahead of the curve and say that the bottom line is that you have to do exactly what is said in the IDF’s order,” Mali added.
The rabbi’s students in the Shirat Moshe yeshiva serve in the Israeli army. The Yeshiva is sponsored by the Israeli government. … Full article
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