How the Guardian and BBC Got Swept up in a Wave of Antisemitism
In the Telegraph, James Warrington has written an excellent piece on bias, antisemitism and the use of language in the coverage of the Israel-Hamas conflict by Left-leaning media outlets and its implications for journalistic impartiality. Here’s an excerpt:
For Israeli satirists, the BBC’s coverage of the Hamas conflict was simply too good to resist.
In a sketch on Eretz Nehederet, Israel’s answer to Saturday Night Live, actors lampooned the British broadcaster’s coverage of a rocket attack on a hospital in Gaza with a spoof news bulletin.
“More, more,” urges the stern-looking presenter, clad in a blonde wig, as the number of alleged fatalities from the attack jumps randomly higher. “We love Hamas,” reads the scrolling text below. …
But beneath the comic veneer lies serious concern. Across Israel, and around the world, frustrations have grown at how many parts of the media have reported the conflict.
The BBC, a lightning rod for controversy, has found itself at the centre of the firefight. But it is not alone. Publications including the Guardian and the New York Times have repeatedly come under criticism from politicians and Jewish groups amid allegations of bias and even antisemitism in their coverage.
For many observers, the conflict has exposed a clear hypocrisy in how Left-leaning media outlets, who pride themselves on their progressive stance, approach stories about Israel. And behind the scenes at these organisations, bosses are grappling with divisions among their politically-charged employees as tensions bubble to the surface.
So as the conflict drags on and the threat of escalation lingers, will the media emerge unscathed as the western Left indulges in Hamas’s poison?
Since the terror attacks of October 7th, all news outlets have been plunged into a quagmire of confusion, disinformation and conflicting testimony. But amid all this, it is those organisations to the left of the political spectrum – whether in their internal culture or more overtly in their output – that have found themselves most often under pressure.
The BBC, New York Times, Reuters and Press Association were all forced to backtrack over their breathless reporting of the blast at the Al Ahli Arab Hospital in Gaza that killed hundreds of Palestinians.
The media outlets were quick to conclude that the explosion had been caused by an Israeli strike, despite relying on Hamas officials as their key source. U.S. intelligence officials now believe the blast was caused by a failed rocket fired by the Palestinian Islamic Jihad.
The BBC apologised for speculating on the cause of the explosion, but not before Israel accused the broadcaster of perpetuating a “modern blood libel” – a reference to false claims dating back to the Middle Ages that Jews killed Christian boys.
U.S. President Joe Biden was reportedly furious at the New York Times’s credulous coverage, warning it could have led to an escalation in the Middle East. The U.S. newspaper offered a full apology, admitting its editors “should have taken more care with the initial presentation, and been more explicit about what information could be verified”.
While the hospital blast marked the nadir of press coverage of the conflict to date, it is far from an isolated incident.
The BBC was forced to launch an urgent investigation after several of its journalists in the Middle East appeared to celebrate the Hamas attacks.
Meanwhile, the public service broadcaster has tied itself in knots over its refusal to brand Hamas a terrorist organisation, opting instead to use the word “militants”. …
Furious debates over language may seem parochial, but on topics as fraught as the Israel-Palestine conflict, words matter.
When a murderous mob stormed the Dagestan airport in Russia in search of Jewish passengers from Israel, the Associated Press newswire described the incident as a “protest”. This, in turn, was picked up by publishers including the Washington Post.
And when a Gazan who featured in a 2019 BBC documentary said revolutionary songs “encourage you to rip a Yehudi’s head off”, the broadcaster caused controversy by translating the Arabic word to “Israeli” instead of “Jew”. …
Whether through overt antisemitism or more subtle uses of language, the controversy has shed light on the contradictions embedded within Left-wing media outlets.
While claiming to speak truth to power and be an arbiter of morality, the publications appear blind to the prejudices espoused by many of their employees, and in turn in their coverage.
Worth reading in full.
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There has been very little actual antisemitism. Some, by a few pillocks. Mostly criticism of Israel though. Not the same thing.
That’s a convenient distinction.
So, just tell me; you, presumably deplore the murder of 6m Jews, but are somewhat equivocal over the murder of 1,400? Where’s the dividing line? How many Jews does Hamas need to kill before it goes beyond what’s acceptable?
Why would those making decisions on behalf of Israel care about 1400 murders other than using it to justify their actions and garner support? It’s just collateral damage to a government. Whether it’s Hamas, or the regime in Israel, UK, US etc: they all get dirty when it suits their own interests.
Perhaps the question should be broader. How many fellow humans do all these regimes need to kill before it becomes unacceptable?
International law suggests Israel has every right to do what it is doing. Hopefully, they will erase Hamas.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/10/27/international-law-backs-israels-right-to-defend-itself/
One should add that Hamas care as much about those who elected them as they do Jews. Hamas caused this. Not Israel. Not Jews. Murderous, barbarian Muslims.
You can’t “erase” Hamas. Even if Israel kill every last man woman and child in Palestine (which they seem intent on doing), it will only create more anger elsewhere, including in the Arab world, and in the west amongst Palestinians and among Muslims and non-Muslims alike. Do you really not see, Israel can’t just murder their way out of this?
And really Jeremyp99, your comment “murderous barbarian Muslims” is just explicitly prejudiced and shows an entrenched bias. Not a position of thoughtfulness or humanity. You’re part of the reason there is so much heat around this. While people like you continue to call to escalate, the world moves closer to ww3, possibly nuclear. Please, start to think.
I’m not equivocal over 1400. There shouldn’t have been any Hamas atrocity either. Hope that answers your question.
Ditto the reverse. As for the 1400 – maybe check Haaretz for the numbers and how they died.
Don’t know about anyone else, but I’m getting exhausted by it all. Perhaps time to take another break?
The Left is innately and inevitably anti-Semitic because it hates any institution or identity which sustains beliefs and authorities beyond and above those endorsed by the revolutionary state. Where, then, is Jewish identity and community most secure? In the conditions of tolerationist ethnic-nationalism practised between emancipation and the rise of a certain German chancellor; and in the second variant of the same which flourished (in the west) between 45 and 89 and for a few years after that. The reasons for this are clear. First, small minorities do no harm. Second, Europe is used to such minorities – Catholics in Protestant areas, Protestants in Catholic regions. Third, the Jewish community has been part of Europe for centuries, often with a greater degree of continuity than the current native culture – the Jews of Rome, for example, were there among the Romans and remained among the Romans’ Gothic successors. This tolerant nationalism has been deliberately poisoned and undermined by the hard left on a number of fronts – multiculturalism, mass immigration and the attack on childhood, sexual normality and family life. It is becoming clear that the assault on these last, most crucial elements in society – most crucial because they… Read more »
This has got to be one of the biggest piles of crap I’ve ever read on here.
Your knowledge of history is just laughable.
I’ll give just a couple of examples: the leadership of the Bolsheviks, who murdered hundreds of thousands of Orthodox Christians after coming out on top in Russia, was majority Jewish. As were the members of the Frankfurt School.
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Good of you to admit so quickly that you can’t beat me using reason and evidence.
They’re clearly beyond you.
So explain how I’m wrong about the composition of the Bolshevik leadership and the Frankfurt School.
Oh: you’re also a terrible, terrible writer.
Because it’s irrelevant. They might have had flat feet – does that make flat footedness the origin of Marxist madness? No. Nor did they act as agents of Jewish religion or culture and indeed they were hostile to it – witness the Stalinist “Doctors’ plot”. It might interest you to know – if your eager prejudice can let your mind contemplate the fact for one second – that many of the most powerful critics of communism were also Jewish – Popper and Koestler, for example – or are you now going to say that this was “insincere”? The simple fact is that as intelligence test after intelligence test has shown, Jews are routinely very bright and will therefore argue powerfully for a variety of ideas, some good, some bad – like the rest of us but a little more so.
Did they have flat feet?
I’ve never seen any argument that they did.
Were they overwhelmingly Jewish?
Yep
Was Marx a Jew?
Yep.
Why have Jews been expelled so many times?
Because they had flat feet? Or because their vicious ethnocentrism and racial supremacism repeatedly pissed people off?
‘Jews are routinely very bright’. So are many. Your bias is clear.
As clear as your ignorance. Look at the stats – Charles Murray – Two Truths about Race in America.
Just as an aside. Interestingly the majority of the leaders of the Mar 1917 Bolshevik Revolution were Js but they were not Zs. They were internationalists not nationalists. They had no interest in creating a J*ish homeland. The Zs of Russia and Eastern Europe, it seems, looked to their friends in the banking/finance world of Britain and America to work on their respective governments to deliver their ambitions. The Rothschilds of course were one of the prime movers in giving that assistance.
Over the last 3.5 years I’ve learnt well that the BBC, Guardian and MSM in general are liars and part of the RPTB.
But, when it comes to this, I just look at the score since 1948 and Isralel’s theft of land as confirmed by the UN (but I suppose they’re anti semetic as well).
In the last few weeks we’ve seen the IDF kill 10,000 mainly innocent civilians, mainly women and children, cut the Gaza strip in half and reduce a large extent of it to rubble.
To achieve what exactly? I’d guess to force all Palestinians out. And you think that’s fair?
All they’ve done is to create a new generation of “terrorists”.
Daily Sceptic, open your eyes-if you’re capable – and just think of the suffering that Palestine has had to endure since 1948. Maybe you’d begin to understand why Hamas came to be born in 1948.
I’m getting pretty tired of the highlighted articles here on DS.
Im not anti semitic, I’m anti genocide, anti propaganda. This focus on anti semitism in news coverage is lame and leftist.
1987, not 1948
Hamas didn’t form til 1987.
Instead of ‘Swept up in’ for the headline, which makes it sound like they were unwitting dupes, I actually think the BBC and the rest of the usual suspects are ‘willing participants in’.
I couldn’t agree more. The BBC and The Groan as unwitting dupes? That takes the firkin biscuit.
https://miriaf.co.uk/an-11th-hour-offensive/
As many of us suspected next weekend is a government trap.
Fishy – YOU will be responsible for any lives lost or damaged.
Maybe the psyops is to STOP people attending. The US embassy (Wandsworth) is 5 miles from the Cenoptaph after all – so what’s the real issue?
I disagree with Miri that we live in a ‘secular liberal democracy’. There has never been a democracy in the UK as a Remembrancer sits in Parliament voting down anything which doesn’t benefit The City. As for ‘genocidal terrorists who wish to obliterate Israel’ – Hamas removed the destruction of Israel (and by the way it was the State of Israel) from its covenant in 2006 in order to get elected. The UK didn’t consider the political arm of Hamas a terrorist org until 2021 and if the armed-to-the-teeth Islamic/Muslim countries surrounding Israel had really wanted to ‘erase Israel off the face of the map’ they’d have done it by now. Actions speak louder than words. It is Israel (or Netanyahu and his IDF henchmen – most of whom had stood down in protest against Bibi prior to Nov 7th) – that are currently wiping Gaza off the face of the map.
We need to get a grip.
1918, my grandfather came out of the Royal Engineers and was a pioneer of radio. He was a founder member of the BBC. He wouldn’t recognise it today.
I’ve personally tracked the BBCs demonisation of Israel for a quarter of that period, submitted countless complaints, with zero success.
My FOI submission, after a year of BBC bullying, eventually found it upholds a tiny 0.014% of complaints.
Led by the likes of Jeremy Bowen, on a literal daily basis the BBC finds a way to misrepresent Israel – Israel the bullying land thief, Palestinians the innocent, helpless victims.
The BBC always provides Hamas with the moral equivalence of a democratically elected people. Imagine doing that to Goebbels in 1943.
So far in 2023, the BBC has reported only 2% of all terror attacks.
My 25 year view is the BBC, as the worlds best funded, most influential news source has played a major part in encouraging Hamas and its useful idiots in the West.
I sincerely believe 1400 people would be alive and 240 people free today were it not for the BBCs pernicious and deceitful influence.
Maybe read Haaretz. You might be shocked by what it has to say about Israel.
I wouldn’t.
As with the rest of the world, the MSM is controlled by the hard left, globalists. Much of the Israeli media is anti Zion. Note for example how they demonise Netanyahu because he wants Israel’s democratically elected government to possess more authority than its leftist Supreme Court.
If people wantna reliable Israeli news feed try JNS. i24 News live (Youtube) is fair too.
The Muslim population of the UK is much, much larger than the Jewish population.
As a result of ongoing mass immigration, high birthrates and conversion it is growing very rapidly. It is also keen on electoral fraud.
The Jewish population isn’t growing, as far as I can see: the ones in heavy black clothes with 2 kitchens might have lots of kids but the others inter-marry – as my “Uncle Eric” married my “Aunty Joan”, my Mum’s cousin – and emigration must surely be higher than immigration. .
Supporting Islam is siding with the demographic winners.
“Supporting Islam is siding with the demographic winners.”
https://www.conservativewoman.co.uk/how-the-west-was-lost-part-1/
“This is the first of a four-part series running over consecutive Sundays about how the secularised West has opened the door to Islamism (and barbarity and de-civilisation), and how intolerance is defeating the West’s hard-won tradition of toleration.”
As this excellent article makes clear – import the third world and what do we get? The answer is in bold above.
Racist. But that’s okay when it’s Islamophobia right? TCW – gimme a break.
‘It is also keen on electoral fraud’. Who isn’t? Bit biased to suggest it’s the Muslim population. BTW, most Muslims in the UK are Bangladeshi, Punjabi, Indian and Pakistani – nothing to do with Palestine or the Middle East and India is standing with Israel.
This seriously inappropriate name-calling is starting to get really pathetic. Pretty much like Valdi Puti’s attempt to claim he hadn’t really attacked Ukraine, actually. Arabs and Jews have live in peace among each other for centuries, ie, there is no such thing as Arabic antisemitism.¹ The state of Israel has made a lot of new enemies among the muslim population of the world during it’s short and rather violent history and for as long as it doesn’t fundamentally change its policy, this is very unlikely to change. If the political leaders of this state were honest, they’d accept that their own actions have consequences instead of trying to play this particular Nazis everwhere! victim card.
¹ As opposed to German antisemitism which was an influential, popular movement long before the NSDAP came to power. This can, for instance, be seen by Hitler stating that such-and-such a pro-German political group in Austria before the first world war had adhered to the wrong kind of antisemitism in Mein Kampf, ie, implicitly taking it for granted that any German nationalist movement would necessarily by antisemitic as well.
We can deduce from the downvotes that 77 Brigade has been ordered to be pro- Zionist.
Spot on. Those idiots are everywhere. Wouldn’t mind if they actually changed their manuals since Covid, lockdown, jabs and Russia Ukraine conflict.
Goodbye Daily Sceptic! My subscription ends here!
So many of your articles are quotes from, or paraphrases of, the Daily Telegraph, the Daily Mail etc. I have sat by and watched you publish divisive articles about the Middle East situation, mostly exhibiting a distinct bias.
Such articles only serve to distract from the serious over-arching power grab going on globally. Our Goverment – and indeed Parliament as a whole – are not serving the good people of this country. Global powers are at work to undermine humanity. This is where you should be focussing your attention.
I started with Lockdown Sceptic back in 2020, contributing in the forum. There I found like-minded sceptics challenging the nonsense science, the hoax pandemic and the coerced experimental injections misnamed as ‘vaccines’. I thank you for providing that platform.
Apart from your reporting on the climate scam and other occasional articles, I am no longer moved to sponsor your reporting.
“Global powers are at work to undermine humanity. This is where you should be focussing your attention.” Mike, I cannot disagree with this. The last week or two seem to have revolved around the Israel / Hamas conflagration, a bit of eco nuttery, wokeism, the Hallett and that’s it. Frankly it is not good enough. I am doing my best to find articles that provide proper analysis of our situation and fortunately ‘The Conservative Woman’ has provided some excellent articles this week along with Off-G, Global Research and the wonderful Dr Mike Yeadon. And I have posted these on DS. Too many News Roundup articles appear from Toby’s occasional employers such as The Speccie, Spiked, and The Torygraph and of course the Daily Mail. The Speccie and Torygraph are behind bloody pay walls. I am not going to name names because there are too many but without the links and references provided by members DS would be an over-priced subscription service. It is fortunate that I value the camaraderie the site provides because output at the moment is on the lacklustre side. Where for instance is the research and reporting on the Pandemic Preparedness Treaty and the International Health Regulations… Read more »
I completely agree with you.
The DS is showing its true colours. Just another fake binary, MI5-condoned.
I don’t like seeing the truly awake leave. But this latest op has been very successful.
If not “the last card” that they will play it is a great divider of people who can’t get out of their old ideological blinders.
I dropped my Gold FSU subscription and my DS one is hanging by a thread.
Ultimately, unfortunately the Great Game, the globalist plan to destroy our free Western society or to accelerate it, is not the main focus here.
This is because TY and his compatriots are still operating under the Cock-up paradigm, As such they cannot even conceive of the possibility that they too are being manipulated in this latest Operation; Oct 7.
Take care mate I’ll probably be joining you soon.
I’m just going to leave this from yet another ex-Muslim turned human rights activist here;
”I don’t even understand antisemitism, tbh. It was easy to understand it growing up because it was clearly a religious demand. But I can’t figure out why secular ppl have this much hate. Like if you’re going to be so bigoted that you’re gonna hate a ppl for their religion, you skipped past the ones that actually engaged in holy wars across the planet and you decided you’d hate on the only ones that DON’T proselytize and conquer and invade and colonize? What’s your problem with 0.2% of the planet? Too many Nobel prizes? Too many successful doctors, lawyers, artists, and scientists? What exactly is it that you hate about Jewish ppl? I don’t want to hear the lies that this has anything to do w Israel when you are out there screaming gas the Jews and Khaybar Khaybar etc. This is hate for Jewish ppl and we all know it. We just don’t know why.”
https://twitter.com/YasMohammedxx/status/1720423535733043402
“The ones that DON’T proselytize and conquer and invade and colonize”
Errm, they conquered, invaded and colonised Palestine.
And surely Muslims proselytize and Christian used to do so because they want to share the benefits with everybody rather than just restrict them to a tiny minority.
Their holy texts explicitly tell them to kill the jews where they stand. People who take that seriously have no place in our society.
Yes exactly. What is it people fail to grasp about, ”When people show you who they are, believe them”? M. Angelou.
This here is a turn up for the books and incredibly heartening to see. Iranians standing in solidarity with Jews and Israelis in London yesterday. Great speech from this lady, she’s calling out the unacceptable BS and hypocrisy ( 3min );
”We, the British Iranians and the people of Iran along with the rest of the diaspora stand with the people of Israel and we condemn all terroristic attacks on civilians we condemn Hamas and we condemn the anti-somatic behaviour that we are witnessing en masse in The West.”
https://twitter.com/GhorbaniiNiyak/status/1721172753812803908
“Anti-somatic behaviour”
What’s that?
What entitles her to speak for “the people of Iran”?
This is seriously serious rubbish. Muslims, Christians and Jews are regarded as religions of the book which means Christians and Jews are to be tolerated (as opposed to, say, so-called idol worshippers aka [polytheistc] pagans). All three faiths have the same Jewish roots in common, by the way, they just differ in additions and in proscribed worshipping procedures.
Yep: Mizrahi Jews had existed in Muslim-ruled countries for many, many centuries before Israel was created by Jews who had spent the previous 2,000 years living in Europe and who were on average of 60% European ancestry.
Please do quote where the Koran explicitly says this.
You can’t, because it’s a lie.
It’s the Muslim extremists who use the Koran as a literal instruction manual and preach hate and intolerance that are the problem. Not the peaceful ones who integrate ( usually referred to as ”moderate” ) into Western cultures and only go to the mosque once or twice a year.
”The Jews, meanwhile, will in the end times fare little better. Muhammad said:
“The last hour would not come unless the Muslims will fight against the Jews and the Muslims would kill them until the Jews would hide themselves behind a stone or a tree and a stone or a tree would say: Muslim, or the servant of Allah, there is a Jew behind me; come and kill him.”[19]”
https://www.jihadwatch.org/the_truth_about_muhammad
Not the Koran.
So stop with your lies or your ignorance to dehumanise people to blind you to evil devastation of innocents.
What lies and ignorance? More like your denialism. Go read the piece I posted in the News Round-Up. Try reading something which doesn’t confirm your bias once in a while. You’re like a broken record.
It’s pretty pointless to quote this obviously fake cr*p and you’re not rendering anyone a service by doing so.
Quote from a real jihad: Accept Islam, and live in peace under the sultan as Christians; and if any man prefer, let him depart peaceably, taking his goods with him! But if you resist, then death or despoilation or slavery shall be the fate of you all!
[Address of grand vizier Kara Mustafa to the citizens of Vienna at the beginning of the siege of Vienna in 1683. Naturally, this would have included the Viennese Jews living in peace under the sultant as well, just as they already did all over the Ottoman Empire]
History really didn’t begin in 1949.
I’ll again make a suggestion I’ve made several times: before mindlessly siding with Jews or Muslims, why not consider what is in OUR interests?
Ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians clearly isn’t. Neither is a wider war in the ME. Therefore siding with Israel is moronic.
Do Israel and its supporters seriously believe that reporting of the al-Ahli explosion was biased by the lamentable disinformation about the murder of William of Norwich in 1144? If they do, why would anyone take them seriously? If they don’t, why are they surprised to be dismissed as shameless propagandists?
https://t.me/robinmg/31572
In the name of humanity, we demand a ceasefire.
I REJECT THE ENTIRE 10/7 PSYOP
I’m NOT on the side of “Hamas”
I’m NOT on the side of Netanyahu
Netanyahu & “Hamas” are on the same side: #WAR
I’m on the side of #CeasefireNOW
The psyop is designed to start #WW3
To accelerate the #GreatReset
Because the #Covid ID plan failed
They need ALL nations to come out badly from this
To install a #OneWorldGovernment
Under the #UnitedNations: the only “good” actor
Then they will control all of us from the #UN & #WHO
And a new “#pandemic” will begin again..
And they will ask us to inject ourselves again
Millions will die, again, from the “vaccine” toxicity..
And the depopulation program will be complete.
Yep this.
‘The media outlets were quick to conclude that the explosion had been caused by an Israeli strike, despite relying on Hamas officials as their key source’. Actually they went by a tweet from Netanyahu’s key aid (hastily removed) that the hospital had been targeted. The subsequent ‘Hamas phone recording’ was exposed as a fake (one phone used for its construction – they’re getting clumsy) by amomg others – Channel 4. As for the DT – their job (as with most papers who meet with the MOD every 2 months for ‘briefings’) is to fan the flames of division. Maybe the Daily Sceptic should change its name to the Daily. Scepticism has all but gone out the window. Good to know though that some Israeli’s find some humour from the reporting of the carpet-bombing of Gaza.