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BBC loses its “impartiality” yet again over the west-Iran standoff

By Abbas Khani – CASMII – March 5, 2012

Is the BBC really aligned with warmongers? Will it continue to play the same role it played in months leading to the invasion of Iraq? Many of the BBC’s reports and programmes containing a reference to Iran alarmingly support this assumption.

While the BBC claims impartiality since the end of World War II, it is trotting a very delicate line of deliberate bias in many different and usually complex ways. This bias becomes more visible in matters of international affairs compared to domestic politics.

Many believe that the difference between the BBC and other corporate media is that the BBC’s manipulation of the public’s mind is more sophisticated in that it is more subtle and implicit and therefore more effective.

While there are countless examples of biased reporting and analyses in the history of the BBC, probably the most bitter and lasting for Iranians is its key role in bringing down the popular democratically elected government of Mohammad Mosaddegh in the joint coup d’etat by the British and American intelligence services which reinstated the US client Monarchy for another 25 years in Iran.

The role of corporate media in illegal war against Iraq is unquestionable and has been verified by many investigators including Paul Long and Tim Wall. The false statements used to justify the invasion of Iraq not only were not questioned but also were reinforced by the media. The documentary, The War You Don’t See, directed by the veteran investigative journalist, John Pilger, shows shocking evidence of how corporate media including the BBC paved the way for military intervention in Iraq. In the current western manufactured hype over Iran’s nuclear program, which has led to the imposition of draconian sanctions and the threat of military strikes, the BBC plays its role very well, as an instrument of war, by its biased programs and reporting.

One such report written by Jonathan Markus, the BBC’s diplomatic correspondent was broadcast on 27 February. Without explicitly saying, in his article “How Israel might strike at Iran”, Jonathan Markus assumes and tries to inculcate also into the reader’s subconscious the idea that there is no question about the legitimacy of such a war; the war is justified and the only question to be discussed is how and what it might look like.

Although the programme starts with the “potential nuclear-armed Iran threat” but gives the impression that this potential threat is very likely to become a reality, and then moves on to address Israel’s worries. This and similar programmes by the BBC by discussing procedural details of possible military operations without questioning the legitimacy and the legality of such operations, serve to normalise the idea of war and prepare the public’s mind for a military confrontation with Iran. Now there is still time for all peace loving people, for all those concerned with emancipation and justice, to oppose another catastrophic illegal war before it becomes too late. Given the crucial role that corporate media played in manipulating the public opinion in preparation for the invasion of Iraq, the campaign against war should start with a relentless opposition against biased pro-war media programs and reports.

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March 6, 2012 Posted by | Deception, Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Militarism, Timeless or most popular, Wars for Israel | , , , | Leave a comment

B[elated] Broadcasting Corporation reports on ‘UK’s secret mission to beat Gaddafi’ — Silent on not-so-secret mission to beat Assad

By Maidhc Ó Cathail | The Passionate Attachment | February 11, 2012

Almost a year late, on January 19 the BBC “revealed”:

British efforts to help topple Colonel Gaddafi were not limited to air strikes. On the ground – and on the quiet – special forces soldiers were blending in with rebel fighters. This is the previously untold account of the crucial part they played.

On February 8, the Israeli intelligence-linked Debkafile reported:

British and Qatari special operations units are operating with rebel forces under cover in the Syrian city of Homs just 162 kilometers from Damascus, according to debkafile’s exclusive military and intelligence sources. The foreign troops are not engaged in direct combat with the Syrian forces bombarding different parts of Syria’s third largest city of 1.2 million. They are tactical advisers, manage rebel communications lines and relay their requests for arms, ammo, fighters and logistical aid to outside suppliers, mostly in Turkey.

This site is the first to report the presence of foreign military forces in any of the Syrian uprising’s embattled areas.

Our sources report the two foreign contingents have set up four centers of operation – in the northern Homs district of Khaldiya, Bab Amro in the east, and Bab Derib and Rastan in the north. Each district is home to about a quarter of a million people.

How long will it take before the venerable Beeb decides to report the “Inside story of the UK’s secret mission to beat Assad”?

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February 11, 2012 Posted by | Deception, Militarism, Timeless or most popular | , | Leave a comment

“Free Pale*****”: BBC tries to settle censorship row

Left Foot Forward | February 2, 2012

The BBC Trust has announced that it is satisfied with the decision to censor the word Palestine from a freestyle performance by the rapper Mic Righteous.

In the show, which aired 11 February last year, Righteous rapped:

“I still have the same beliefs

“I can scream Free Palestine,

“Die for my pride still pray for peace,

“Still burn a fed for the brutality

“They spread over the world.”

The production team made the decision to put a sound effect, of glass smashing, over the word Palestine. You can listen to the whole performance here, or the offending section here.

In response to the original complaints, the BBC executive argued (pdf)

that BBC Radio 1Xtra and the BBC as a whole had a duty to be impartial. In this instance, the production team felt that Mic Righteous was expressing a political viewpoint which, if it had been aired in isolation, would have compromised impartiality.

The BBC’s guidelines on impartiality state:

The audience expects artists, writers and entertainers to have scope for individual expression in drama, entertainment and culture. The BBC is committed to offering it.

Where this covers matters of public policy, political or industrial controversy, or other “controversial subjects”, services should normally aim to reflect a broad range of the available perspectives over time.

Interestingly, the BBC apparently considers “scream Free Palestine” to be more of a controversial statement than “burn a fed”. The Trust has now released its adjudication of the matter, but in so doing has dodged the question.

They write:

The Committee agreed that it is for the Executive to decide what to include and what not to include in a broadcast, provided the result does not lead to a breach of the BBC’s Editorial Guidelines.

The Committee agreed that its duty was to assess whether the material as broadcast was likely to have been in breach of the BBC’s Editorial Guidelines, in this case those relating to impartiality.

In other words, in response to complaints that the BBC was unfairly censoring an artist, the Trust has instead examined whether the finished program breached impartiality guidelines. Given the potential breach was never aired, the result of assessment was a foregone conclusion.

Amena Saleem, of the Palestinian Solidarity Campaign, argued:

“The BBC Trust has moved the goalposts and decided to look at the censored content that was broadcast in February and April 2011.

“And the Trustees have decided that the content from which the word ‘Palestine’ had been edited was not biased against Palestine. This level of manipulation and duplicity would not be out of place in Catch 22.“

The BBC needs to answer the real question; not whether the finished show was impartial, but whether it is acceptable policy to censor the word Palestine.

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February 2, 2012 Posted by | Deception, Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Full Spectrum Dominance, Timeless or most popular | , , | Leave a comment

Fukushima: BBC Debunked

By | September 22, 2011

Sources cited

The BBC Program
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b014s49z
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8vywZ84mixs

CNN Report Quoted
http://articles.cnn.com/2011-06-06/world/japan.nuclear.meltdown_1_nuclear-rea…

The Yomiuri Daily Table
http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/dy/national/T110607005367.htm

Atomic-Bombing Survivors Study
http://www.dmphp.org/cgi/reprint/5/Supplement_1/S122

In light of that study, it’s worth noting that the Japanese government calculated that the Cesium-137 alone emitted from Fukushima as of late August was 168 times more radioactive than the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/japan/8722400/Fukushima-caesiu…

IAEA Report Quoted
http://www-pub.iaea.org/MTCD/meetings/PDFplus/2011/cn200/documentation/cn200_…

NYAS Review (Yablokov et al.) Cited
http://www.strahlentelex.de/Yablokov%20Chernobyl%20book.pdf

Extra: detailed complaint submitted to BBC over the program critiqued in this video :
http://www.nfznsc.gn.apc.org/docs/news/NFLA_BBC_Fukushima_final_complaint.pdf

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January 28, 2012 Posted by | Deception, Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Nuclear Power, Timeless or most popular, Video | , , , , | Leave a comment

Beware of the BBC

By Stuart Littlewood | 22 January 2010

Its mission statement says: “Trust is the foundation of the BBC: we are independent, impartial and honest.” However, people are complaining bitterly to the BBC about its pro-Israel stance when reporting on the situation in the Holy Land.

Once renowned as the benchmark for fairness and accuracy, the BBC nowadays is careless with the truth when handling news from the Palestinian territories illegally occupied by Israel – the West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza.

We were treated to a prize example earlier this week. The flagship “Today” programme, which goes out weekdays from 6 a.m. to 9 a.m. on Radio 4, marked the anniversary of Israel’s blitzkrieg with a feature on the Gaza economy, in which I heard presenters claim at least three times that the purpose of Operation Cast Lead was to stop the rocket attacks across the border.

This is untrue. The rockets stopped months before Israel’s assault with the start of the ceasefire, brokered by Egypt, which held from 19 June until 4 November 2008, when Israel deliberately dashed hopes for peace by staging an armed incursion into Gaza, killing several Hamas men.

Under the ceasefire Israel had undertaken to lift the economic blockade, but didn’t do so. Nevertheless Hamas kept its side of the bargain and fired no rockets.

So 1,400 Gazans, including some 350 women and children, didn’t have to die under Israeli bombardment. All Israel needed to do was extend the truce by keeping the peace and lifting the evil blockade as promised.

But it’s not about rockets, is it? No rockets are launched from the West Bank, yet Israel keeps the West Bank tightly sealed and all movement cruelly restricted under a punitive military and administrative matrix of control.

The death and devastation inflicted on Gaza is really about Israel’s unquenchable lust for land and its criminal desire to subjugate, expel or annihilate the native population.

The BBC also failed to provide accurate context regarding the Israeli township of Sderot, the main target for Hamas rockets. Edward Sturton, reporting from Sderot, didn’t explain how the land on which Sderot stands was once a Palestinian village called Najd, whose residents were ethnically cleansed and put to flight by Jewish terrorists in May 1948. Many of them ended up in refugee camps in Gaza. Sderot is therefore a source of real grievance to the Palestinians.

Under UN Resolution 194 and also the Universal Declaration of Human Rights the villagers of Najd, along with hundreds of thousands of others who were dispossessed at gunpoint, are entitled to return to their homes but have been denied their rights by Israel.

So, has our “trustworthy” BBC fallen under Zionist influence just like the British government? It certainly gives a disproportionate amount of air-time to pro-Israel figures such as the Israeli ambassador, the regime’s spokesman Mark Regev, the chief rabbi and assorted politicians who wave the flag for Israel, all of whom speak good, clear English. On the rare occasions when the BBC interviews a Palestinian it chooses someone who is unintelligible. I can’t remember when I last heard the Palestinian ambassador, Manuel Hassassian, who speaks excellent English and can put the Palestinian case eloquently.

The BBC also adopts Israel’s language and definitions. Palestinians not Israelis are the militants. Hamas, not the murdering occupiers, are the terrorists. A single captured Israeli soldier is deemed more newsworthy than the 10,000 abducted Palestinians (some of them women and children) rotting in Israeli jails. It is imperative that Israelis not Palestinians feel secure within their borders. Israelis not Palestinians have a right of self-defence.

A few years ago a study of TV news coverage by Glasgow University’s Media Group showed how the BBC and others distorted the Arab-Israeli conflict and misinformed the British public by presenting the Israeli government perspective and featuring mostly pro-Israel politicians. Today the gap between the BBC and its mission pledge to be “independent, impartial and honest” seems just as wide.

Of course, none of this is news to the Palestinians. I make these points only for the benefit of Western readers, especially Britons and Americans who are victims of media bias, and for Israelis who live on a diet of fiction, and for Zionists everywhere who wouldn’t recognize the truth if it fell on them.

Stuart Littlewood is author of the book Radio Free Palestine, which tells the plight of the Palestinians under occupation. For further information please visit www.radiofreepalestine.co.uk.

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January 21, 2010 Posted by | Deception, Mainstream Media, Warmongering | , , , , | Leave a comment

The BBC’s ‘Conspiracy Files’

By Paul Holme |  January 12, 2010

At 16:15 local time Hong Kong and the Philippines, on Saturday, 9 Jan., the BBC World News service broadcast “The Conspiracy Files,” concerning lingering suspicions about 9/11 — specifically the anomalous, sudden, and complete collapse of Building 7, which was not hit by a plane.

This documentary was, as you might expect, as complete a snow job as the weather presently smothering the UK.

It left me with two lasting impressions:

1. That the relatively unprepared viewer — such as I would take the majority to be — would accept its conclusions as ‘the truth.’ The BBC, like CNN and I suppose Fox News, is the modern-day equivalent of the Bible for many who watch it regularly. It is their Authority, an esteemed organ of “objective” reporting, and so they approach it with their critical defenses down — especially in matters where they can’t claim expertise, and the more so when the BBC solemnly quotes such other purveyors of mainstream truth as the National Institute of Standards and Technology (whose graphic simulation of a beam buckling in Building 7 was deemed sufficient to convince us that every real beam and column gave way likewise, and simultaneously).

2. That it is — and has always been — the inevitable, primary function of the mainstream news outlets to create consensus, rather than division, around a core set of values that have evolved over the years, and which represent the status quo. You can’t broadcast everything, so from the start there’s inevitably a massive selection process. What guides the selection process? “Objectivity”? The very nature of the task logically excludes that possibility! What we actually end up seeing and hearing equally inevitably dominates our thinking. How can you think about what never reaches your senses? You can’t. And thus the status quo rolls effortlessly on.

Those of us who find ourselves uncomfortably outside the mainstream on the 9/11 issue believe that we see things “more objectively,” because, from our different perspective, we are acutely aware of the cherry-picking of “facts” that goes on in support of the Official Version. This cherry-picking is (for the most part) an entirely unconscious selection process. What we are probably less aware of is that we cherry-pick our “facts” too, and this selection is as glaring to the gatekeepers of acceptable knowledge as theirs is to us.

What this in turn betrays is our near-universal misunderstanding of what “facts” are and how we arrive at them. It is not that one group is more “objective” than another. That’s prideful, self-serving nonsense. We do not plug into an objective world that some see and others (for some reason) do not. It simply doesn’t work like that. Each person creates (as he must) his own reality from sensory data which he alone experiences, and then — with more or less vigor and conviction, and with whatever tools are currently fashionable — sets about convincing others to his point of view. This social component of reality is inescapable. Without it we would be living in something like the tower of Babel. Communication would not exist, and neither would society.

Insofar as humans are social beings, truth is a popularity contest (and, yes guys, we are social beings!). This conclusion seems like an outright denial of supposed scientific objectivity; but that is actually the way it is, and there’s no escaping it.

Thus it is that islands of popularity grow, like bacteria in a petri dish, around attractive beliefs, while those which cannot sustain interest wither and die. That, in a nutshell, is what the “factual” world is all about, always has been, and always will be. Facts are not hard and fast things “out there.” Facts are agreements, and like all agreements they can change.

In the BBC’s “The Conspiracy Files” architect Richard Gage, the founder and chief spokesman of Architects and Engineers for 9/11 Truth, asserts that the smoke observed on the south side of Building 7 before its sudden collapse was probably sucked there from Buildings 5 and 6. This theory of his is challenged by video evidence of fires burning on the same side, and other experts insisting that fires such as these could have “spread” and “engulfed” the building, destroying the integrity of the structural steel, and leading to “global collapse.”

The combined psychological force of the BBC, and the video footage, and the experts, and the even, reasonable tone of the commentator all pitted against bald Mr. Gage expostulating in his little office, is overwhelming. The unsurprising conclusion is reached by the Beeb that Building 7 collapsed without explosive assistance, as advertised. The gatekeepers are delighted, their worldview is vindicated, the enemy is brought low, and the status quo lumbers on, unshaken.

Facts? The merest suggestion of them is all that’s needed for those in authority (whatever authority that may be) to secure the hearts and minds of the faithful. “The Conspiracy Files” is the necessary force of social cohesion at work, operating through one of the organs which have evolved for this purpose. Strength resides in numbers. Might is right. To turn the tide requires tremendous perseverance, and the constant reintroduction of evidence which refutes the official version of events. This is subversion, and must be undertaken, of course, without the slightest help from where it counts — the mainstream media.

My own view (for what it’s worth) disagrees with that of Mr. Gage, as his naturally does with others. It is that it’s perfectly possible for the south face of Building 7 to have been blanketed in smoke without our jumping to the conclusion either that the smoke all came from elsewhere (Building 7 was on fire!), or that the six or seven windows (out of hundreds) on one floor (out of 47) at which fire could be seen were evidence that the building was about to collapse straight down at freefall speed into its own footprint. In fact this last assertion, seized on by the BBC and its chosen experts alike, strikes me as equally absurd after watching “The Conspiracy Files” as it did before. But then the BBC World News is not my authority, so I am free to question its selection of facts in a way which a gatekeeper to the official version is not.

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January 12, 2010 Posted by | Deception, False Flag Terrorism, Mainstream Media, Warmongering | , , , , , | Leave a comment

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