it was hamas what done it

Submitted by antarchi on April 25, 2010 - 22:34

UPDATED

What made the Gaza attacks launched on 27 December different from the main wars fought by Israel over the years was that the weapons and tactics used devastated an essentially defenceless civilian population. The one-sidedness of the encounter was so stark, as signalled by the relative casualties on both sides (more than 100 to 1; 1300-plus Palestinians killed compared with 13 Israelis, and several of these by friendly fire), that most commentators refrained from attaching the label “war”.

Richard Falk, UN Special Rapporteur on Palestinian human rights, in Israel’s war crimes

Still, the BBC is determined to see this as a two-sided conflict, and to present issues at all times according to the point of view given by official Israeli spokesmen. Palestinians die; Israelis are killed. Palestinians kidnap; Israelis hold or capture1. Palestinians hide civilians in their midst and cannot be surprised when Israel’s well-directed precision bombs cut short their lives. Hamas’ blundering, home-made rockets deliberately target Israel’s innocent civilians. A Palestinian life cut short is lucky to make a mention in the international media; an Israeli life cut short is front page news2.

No context is given, no reference to international law or UN Resolutions; no mention of occupation and what that means to those who are occupied; no siege or malnutrition in Gaza and no right to self-defence for Palestinians. Hamas is ‘in control’ - no matter that it is the elected government of Gaza.

And all Israeli misdemeanours are caused or prompted by a Palestinian evil further back in time. The Palestinian evils rarely have a cause3.

James Naughtie has perfected this approach, in an interview with Jon Donnison on the Today programme to discuss the latest bombing attack on Gaza. (Extract starts around 6.30 am):

JN: It’s the fact that 2 Israelis were killed last week that’s really prompted this, isn’t it?

JD: Absolutely. I think many people inside Gaza - and indeed Israel - were expecting some sort of military response from Israel. There are airstrikes relatively frequent on Gaza, but what was unusual last week, as you say, is that 2 Israeli soldiers were killed in clashes with Palestinian militants. That is the first time that Israeli soldiers were killed in hostile fire in Gaza in over a year. So that is unusual, and I think that people were expecting some sort of retaliation.

JN: I suppose the question is, given the condition in which ordinary people in Gaza are living, the difficulties that they’re facing, is whether this is the beginning of another extended period in which Israel will mount attacks, or whether this is a one-off signal that it wants to retaliate, and that will be that.

JD: Well I think israel is sending a signal that whenever there is militant activity inside Gaza, it will respond. But as you say, for many ordinary Gazans life is pretty difficult. They’ve been under economic blockade with only limited humanitarian supplies allowed in for more than 2 years, now coming up to 3 years. And Hamas, who control the Gaza strip, I think it’s fair to say have tried to reign in rocket fire coming out of Gaza. There has certainly been reduced rocket fire in the past year and Israel would say that is due to the success of its military operation a year ago. But the fact is, there are many militant groups there, and Hamas does not control all of them. So it is difficult to completely stop rocket fire coming out of Gaza.

My letter to JN:

\r\nDear James Naughtie\r\nIn your brief interview this morning with Jon Donison, you asked: ‘It’s the fact that 2 Israelis were killed last week that’s really prompted this, isn’t it?’ Without giving any additional context, this question surely gives a very misleading picture of events, and would almost certainly have led listeners to believe that ‘Hamas started it’. The Israelis who were killed were in fact soldiers on foreign land, and the Gazan response was an act of self-defence. Given all that had gone before, was it not relevant to highlight this point, at least?

In comparison - imagine that the UK had been living under siege for nearly 3 years, and under occupation for 40 years before that; if we had suffered a major invasion a year ago which had destroyed all infrastructure and caused 1400 deaths (or, relative to the population, 65,000 deaths); and if, about a week ago, the enemy had again crossed over onto British land and we had tried to defend ourselves, in the process killing 2 of their soldiers - what would you then feel it was important to say about the subsequent bombing of our cities? Would you say that it had been ‘prompted by’ our having killed 2 of the enemy’s soldiers? Or would you feel it necessary to outline - and ask about - the context in which yet another attack on British civilians had taken place?

Thank you for your attention

[*]

And to Jon Donnison, who thinks it right to slip into his answer the Israeli interpretation of the massacre - an interpretation which somehow manages to suggest that it was not itself the cause of major loss of life and mass destruction of a region, but instead a road to peace:

Dear Jon Donnison

In your interview this morning on the Today programme you made the following point:

‘And Hamas, who control the Gaza strip, I think it’s fair to say have tried to reign in rocket fire coming out of Gaza. There has certainly been reduced rocket fire in the past year and Israel would say that is due to the success of its military operation a year ago.’

Do you really feel it is appropriate to refer to the ‘success’ of an operation that resulted in 1,400 deaths and the destruction and contamination of a region already deeply impoverished and for 18 months under siege? Israel’s ‘military operation’ has been criticised by international lawyers and human rights organisations as having been wildly disproportionate, not in the name of self-defence, and employing methods almost certainly qualifying as war crimes. Massacres do subdue their survivors, but should we regard this as a ‘success’ story? Should we give credence to those who carry them out and happen to judge them as ‘successful’?

Perhaps more importantly - even before the massacre, Hamas had been ‘reigning in’ rocket attacks, for a good 6 months, and prior to the Israeli air attack which killed 6 of their fighters in Gaza. Hamas had offered to extend the ceasefire, but the offer had been rejected by Israel. Why, therefore, should we regard the massacre (or military operation) as having been important in persuading them to subdue the rocket attacks, rather than looking at their behaviour before the massacre?

Thank you for your attention\r\n[*]

Reply from James Naughtie

\r\nThank you for this. In the two-way at 0630 I merely wanted to put what happened in context: - that the Israeli rreason/excuse was the killing, which is why it had happened. Jon Donnison made the point in the course of our brief two-way that the plight of people in Gaza was extreme, and in the course of the programme later (and the following day) I think it was put in proper context. We also wanted to get across the fact that Hamas, for its own reasons, wants to try to clamp down on some of the other groups and that is why the Israel Defence Force might have taken advantage of the opportunity. What conclusions people draw from that is a matter for them, but I do think the background was laid out. The trouble is that people on both sides of this argument attack us when we dont tell the whole story (from their perspective, of course) every time we do an item. We can’t. All we can do is to try to provide a context in which any interested/reasonably intelligent listener can get enough information to come to an informed view. Across the piece, we did that. I’m sure you understand the problem. It’s a bit like being asked by George Osborne to make sure that every time we mention the words Gordon Brown we retell the history of 13 years from the opposition point of view (or the other way round, from the Labour side). Or that every time we interview a Lib Dem we let them spend a good deal of the interview on the unfairness of the electoral system. We simply can’t. But I think we’ve returned to the subvject of Gaza and the atttitude of people living there - and the fact of Israeli policy over many years - quite regularly. You will be interested to know that when we covered the business of the east Jerusalem settlements the other week we were accused of being virulently anti-Israel (which as you may know is the offical view towards the BBC in Tel Aviv). It’s wrong, of course, but I think it is just as misleading to accuse us of being anti-Palestinian. We just try to paint a picture that, over time, will give people what the need in order to come to a view.\r\nyrs\r\njn\r\n

My reply to JN:

\r\nDear James\r\nMany thanks for your response. I do appreciate that however you present this issue you will be criticised (from various sides), but the important thing is surely not how many sides you satisfy, or fail to satisfy, but the extent to which the picture is presented as a whole. One would, after all, expect even an objective account to be criticised by those caught up in the conflict.

I am a bit surprised that you feel the context was put across objectively in the course of the programme on the 2nd (and 3rd) March. I have now listened to the other reports on those days, and I have noted the following points, which I would see as important differences in reporting both sides’ views. I would be interested to have your comments on the apparent discrepancy:

1. The Israeli spokesman was given a full 4 minutes to put the Israeli point of view. The Palestinian spokesman was confined to 37 seconds, and was asked only about the warnings that Israel had given - which is probably not the most important (or controversial) aspect of the whole episode.

2. No-one spoke, either on Friday or Saturday about the impact on the ground of the bombing, although 3 children were injured, and I find it hard to imagine that this would have been ignored if it had been Sderot or Askelon which had been targetted instead.

3. No-one questioned the Israeli spokesman’s claim that weapons factories were targetted (and hit), and he was even prompted to talk about these weapons. Palestinian accounts are that a cheese factory, a metal factory and 2 caravans were hit, yet this was not mentioned at all4.

4. It was mentioned that 2 Israeli soldiers were killed as a precursor to the bombing, but no mention was made of the 2 Palestinian ‘militants’ (soldiers?) who were killed at the same time5, let alone of other Palestinian deaths (in the week before that, 4 Palestinians, 2 of them teenagers, were killed as a result of Israeli fire in the West Bank. This was barely reported at all on the BBC6)

5. The Israeli spokesman was given the chance to speak about ‘more than 40 incidents’ this year in which missiles were fired by Palestinians. I wonder how many listeners are aware that there have been no casualties or injuries as a result of these incidents (though, no doubt, a great deal of fear). The incidents this year in which Palestinians are threatened were not discussed - let alone the casualties arising from many of those incidents.

These points may seem small, but when taken together they add up to a picture which appears to emphasise Israeli victims and fear over that of the Palestinians. Given the vastly disproportionate number of casualties on the Palestinian side, as opposed to those on the Israeli side, and given the fact that it is Israel and not Palestine which is the occupying power under international law, this seems a strange way of presenting the ‘whole’ picture.

Why was it not possible, at the very least, to give the Palestinian spokesman the same amount of time as the Israeli one?

With thanks for your time
[*]

  • 1. See Glasgow University Media Group’s report on TV news coverage of the Israel/Palestine conflict: ‘There were also differences in the language used by journalists for Israelis and Palestinians - words such as ‘atrocity’, ‘brutal murder’, ‘mass murder’, ‘savage cold blooded killing’, ‘lynching’ and ‘slaughter’ were used about Israeli deaths but not Palestinian.’
  • 2. ‘There was a strong emphasis on Israeli casualties on the news, relative to Palestinians (even though Palestinians had around 2-3 times the number of deaths as Israelis). In one week in March 02 which the BBC reported as having the most Palestinian casualties since the start of the intifada, there was actually more coverage on the news of Israeli deaths.’ ibid
  • 3. ‘On the news, Israeli actions tended to be explained and contextualised - they were often shown as merely “responding ” to what had been done to them by Palestinians (in the 2001 samples they were six times as likely to be presented as “retaliating ” or in some way responding than were the Palestinians). ibid
  • 4. See http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE6304JQ20100401
  • 5. See http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/8589529.stm Note the page heading, in bold - and the mention of Palestinian militants somewhere down the page
  • 6. See Media Lens’ account of this