Interesting opinion piece in Guardian on Bias in reporting

[pseudolus]

Source

'Israel under renewed Hamas attack', says the BBC. More balance is needed
The macabre truth is that Israeli life is deemed by the western media to be worth more than a Palestinian life – this is the hierarchy of death at work


Israeli soldiers and tanks near the border with the Gaza Strip this week.

"Israel under renewed Hamas attack": this was last night's BBC headline on the escalating bloodshed in Gaza. It is as perverse as Mike Tyson punching a toddler, followed by a headline claiming that the child spat at him. As Elizabeth Tsurkov, a Tel Aviv-based Israeli human rights activist, tweeted: "We are targeted by mostly shitty rockets. Gazans are being shelled with heavy bombs. We have shelters, sirens, Iron Dome. They have 0."

There is no defence for Hamas firing rockets into civilian areas, and as sirens wail in Israel, the fear among ordinary Israelis should not be ignored or belittled. But the media coverage hardly reflects the reality: a military superpower armed with F-15 fighter jets, AH-64 Apache helicopters, Delilah missiles, IAI Heron-1 drones and Jericho II missiles (and nuclear bombs, for that matter), versus what David Cameron describes as a "prison camp" firing almost entirely ineffective missiles. Twenty-seven Palestinians are reported to have died in Gaza – and, mercifully, no Israelis have been killed by Hamas rockets – and yet the BBC opts for the Orwellian "Israel under renewed Hamas attack".

The macabre truth is that Israeli life is deemed by the western media to be worth more than a Palestinian life: here is the "hierarchy of death" at work. According to the Israeli human rights organisation B'Tselem, 565 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli security forces since January 2009, while 28 Israeli civilians and 10 Israeli security personnel have been killed. The asymmetry of this so-called conflict is reflected in the death toll, but it is not reflected in the coverage.

And so it goes for the events surrounding the abduction and vile murder of three Israeli teenagers. What was not widely reported by the western media was that – in the raids that followed their disappearance – six Palestinians, including a child, were killed by Israeli forces in the West Bank. As Amnesty International put it, these were "blatant violations of international humanitarian and human rights law".

Perhaps our media will excuse themselves on the basis of motive: whoever killed the three teenagers intended to do so, while Israel only kills civilians unintentionally. Read, then, the report of Human Rights Watch, not an organisation that can be accused of being a den of lefties. Israel's actions "amounted to collective punishment", it declared, because of "unlawful use of force, arbitrary arrests, and illegal home demolitions". Human Rights Watch investigated two deaths and found "there was no evidence that the victim or anyone in the line of fire posed an imminent threat to Israeli soldiers or others". On 17 June, 20-year-old Ahmed Samada was shot dead in Jalazon refugee camp, and yet Israel did not even claim to have come under fire; the same for 17-year-old Sakher Abu Aal-Hasan, shot dead on 21 June.

The BBC is a public broadcaster, duty-bound to provide balanced reports that accurately reflect the reality on the ground. It is failing to do so, and it is up to licence payers – to whom it is accountable – to demand that it does.

[taxexile]

....and of course the guardian is a stranger to bias.

Israel

a military superpower armed with F-15 fighter jets, AH-64 Apache helicopters, Delilah missiles, IAI Heron-1 drones and Jericho II missiles (and nuclear bombs, for that matter)

Hamas

"prison camp" firing almost entirely ineffective missiles.

Then why are Hamas doing it, if not to goad Israel into a justified heavy handed response followed as sure as night follows day by the bleating of the right on journos
"unfair, unfair, sympathy, sympathy, poor little hard done by Palestinians, women children" etc etc etc and "bombs, soldiers, $$$$$, £££££, America, nasty fucking blue suede shoes", which is the real subtext.

[harrybarracuda]

Then why are Hamas doing it

Because they get 72 virgins when they get a Hellfire up their arse.

[longway]

I think hamas and the israeli government have a common objective. Never let the ordinary palestian or a palestinian state become stable and successful, if this happens, its to the advantage of neither.

This wound will never stop festering, there are too many cynical people with an interest in never allowing any sort of lasting peace.

[pseudolus]

I think hamas and the israeli government have a common objective. Never let the ordinary palestian or a palestinian state become stable and successful, if this happens, its to the advantage of neither.

Bingo.

Hamas
Quote:
"prison camp" firing almost entirely ineffective missiles.

That's a David Cameron quote.

[Butterfly]

the west is terrified by the Israeli Nazi, like they were with the German Nazi

as usual, we do nothing when there is a genocide and this is not the first time

with western leaders with no courage to stand up against war criminals such as Israel, it's no surprise that those criminals can continue with their mass murders without worry, and set a precedent for other mass murders and genocide.

[taxexile]

as a franco-belgian, you should know all about standing by and watching genocide, your recent ancestors were selling jews to the nazis for a loaf of bread and a pickled herring.

100 dead is hardly genocide, and a good proportion of them probably deserved it.

If Hamas were ever successful in an invasion of Israel, then you would see genocide, which is why those animals need horsewhipping into submission.

[Seekingasylum]

Essentially, Palestine is a fuck up by Britain - Balfour Declaration - and arose when the Ottoman era drew to an end. Jewish migration was very much late 19th Century and therefore scarcely yesterday in Arab terms.

Hardly blame the Palestinians for wanting back what was theirs for practically 2 millennia albeit under differing suzerainty, mostly Arab or Muslim.

Deir Yassin rather set the seal on the Jewish occupation. Quite extraordinary that the Israelis have managed to engender such support for themselves in the face of such an atrocity. But then I suppose if so- called intelligent folk are quite willing to accept Palestinian agencies as " terrorists " and Israelis as the good guys inflicting collateral damage in a worthy cause it was bound to be inevitable.

Sabra and Chatila, the Israeli bombing of South Lebanon civilians with banned cluster munitions, etc., etc. and of course the great wall now constructed to keep the West Bank corralled.

If I were born a Palestinian I would devote my entire life to the destruction of the state of Israel. It would be one's duty, surely?

[pseudolus]

100 dead is hardly genocide, and a good proportion of them probably deserved it.

Genocide is the systematic destruction of all or part of a racial, ethnic, religious or national group via the (a) Killing members of the group; (b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; (c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;(d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; or (e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group. Genocide entails also the Conspiracy to commit genocide; Direct and public incitement to commit genocide; Attempt to commit genocide; and Complicity in genocide

Genocide has no time scale on it. It is ongoing genocide and israel has all aspects of it covered.

The media, especially Zionist led BBC is completely covering this up though. Just like taxexile says, they go with the idea that children deserve to die because israel wants their land. Children barely out of the womb bombed, burnt, mutilated all because the of the aggressive zionist expansion plans and the BBC concerns itself with israel having a few people tragically killed by rockets. More Palestinians were killed by the IDF immediate reprisals on the ground during their arrests than israelis killed by rockets.

[Fluke]

Sabra and Chatila, the Israeli bombing of South Lebanon civilians

Errm, are you talking about the Shatila massacres carried out by the Lebaanese Army in 1982?

[Seekingasylum]

Pseud, Tax is all for it. Have you read it right?

[taxexile]

Just like taxexile says, they go with the idea that children deserve to die because israel wants their land.

Only Hamas deserve to die, but Hamas knowingly situate themselves amongst civilians such is their disregard for the Palestinians who are sadly caught up in the middle.

How come Hamas, who purposely provoke the Israelis into retaliation, have not provided bomb shelters for the Palestinians?



Got to feel sorry for the plight of the Palestinians, they have always had useless leaders forced upon them, but using women and children as shields has always been an Arab strategy.


Hamas Spokesman Encourages Gazans to Serve as Human Shields: It's Been Proven Effective

http://www.memri.org/clip/en/0/0/0/0/0/0/4340.htm

[thaimeme]

This wound will never stop festering, there are too many cynical people with an interest in never allowing any sort of lasting peace.

This certainly would apply to numerous regions of the world, less that volatile hotspot.

Vested interests are too overwhelming.....
Always been this way.

[nidhogg]

There is no defence for Hamas firing rockets into civilian areas,

Case closed.

[pseudolus]

they have always had useless leaders forced upon them,

I can not find it now, but I do remember reading article where it was mentioned that at the start there was a very close link between Hamas and Mossad- the inference was that the direction Hamas has taken is not exactly against israels wishes....they want an excuse for war, expansion, theft, murder, rape, as well as to keep the sheckels dropping into the AIPAC collection plate so they can continue to own washington.

[pseudolus]

It is Jewish lands,

Don't be daft. It is Zionist lands presently, but previously for thousands of years it was Palestine - the land of the Palestinians.

Stop confusing religion (all fake and made up to exploit dimwits, and make money and power of course) with the real world.

[Fluke]

It is Jewish lands,

Don't be daft. It is Zionist lands presently, but previously for thousands of years it was Palestine - the land of the Palestinians.

Stop confusing religion (all fake and made up to exploit dimwits, and make money and power of course) with the real world.

The land was never called Palestine .
There has never been a Country called Palestine .

[Seekingasylum]

It is Jewish lands,

Don't be daft. It is Zionist lands presently, but previously for thousands of years it was Palestine - the land of the Palestinians.

Stop confusing religion (all fake and made up to exploit dimwits, and make money and power of course) with the real world.

The land was never called Palestine .
There has never been a Country called Palestine .

I rather think that would have come as news to Herodotus 2500 years ago.

[pseudolus]

I rather think that would have come as news to Herodotus 2500 years ago.

Rather a lot of greens I owe you really. This is plumb.

(fluke will be thinking "I didn't know there dinosaurs 2500 years ago - I thought the herodotus family were extinct thousands of years before that".

[taxexile]

Hamas and Mossad

Its the spy vs. spy conundrum.

Both sides will resort to temporary nefarious alliances to achieve a goal. Quite normal.

They want an excuse for war, expansion, theft, murder, rape,

No they dont. The Israelis dont trust them, Hamas is out to destroy Israel, its their stated aim. Islamic domination, not only Israel, the whole Western world.

Even lefty right-on whitey Xstians like yourself would be lined up and despatched into a roadside ditch if it ever happened, as it may well do in about 100 or 200 years time if left unchecked. There is no compromise with them.they are driven by Allah.

The Israel-Palestine problem has been taken over and become part of that Islamic crusade.

They are fucking crazy people, madmen, zealots of the worst kind, no-hoper canon fodder led by wild eyed dogmatists and they will take the whole world back to the 14th century if left to it. You should see Israel as the spearhead of the fight to save the West from Islam. Islam cannot share a space with others, it has become too radicalised.

Be careful what you wish for Pseudolus

They will soon reach Vmax, and then god help us all !!!

Thats why we need American power and muscle. Europe are powerless to stop them.

[Seekingasylum]

[QUOTE=taxexile;2818123][QUOTE]

They are fucking crazy people, madmen, zealots of the worst kind, no-hoper canon fodder led by wild eyed dogmatists and they will take the whole world back to the 14th century if left to it.Europe are powerless to stop them.[/QUOTE

I'm glad you see the Welsh as I do. Bloody buggers, all of 'em.

[bsnub]

It is Jewish lands,

Don't be daft. It is Zionist lands presently, but previously for thousands of years it was Palestine - the land of the Palestinians.

Stop confusing religion (all fake and made up to exploit dimwits, and make money and power of course) with the real world.

Technically the Jews where there before the Palestinians. But the Canaanites where there first then the Jews, then the Assyrians and the Babylonians then along came the Persians followed by the Greeks, then the Romans, then the Byzantines etc etc etc.

Really that patch of dirt has changed hand more than just about anyplace on earth. I find it humourous that anyone can have a straight face when they claim it as their own.

[taxexile]

However, I would rather be associated with people opposed to murder, apartheid, genocide, ethnic cleansing

Then wear your Hamas, Hezbollah, Al Qaeda, Boko Haram, ISIS tea shirt with pride Pseudolus, because they all crawled out of the same fetid swamp of radical Islam

[FlyFree]

Sadly, seeing a black/white Israel=good, Hamas/Palestinians/Arabs/Muzzies=bad puts you in the same fetid swamp as radical Islam.

You're not? Of course you are. Blindly justifying what Israel is doing to the Palestinians says so.

You're not blindly justifying? Of course you are.There's no balance shown, ever.

It's all bit disingenuous. In spades.



Newsflash. The Jews were never shy of using terror tactics.

[pseudolus]

Then wear your Hamas, Hezbollah, Al Qaeda, Boko Haram, ISIS

Why? I do not support any of these thugs. Why would you think so? You think saying what israel does and is doing is bad makes me a terrorist lover does it? ADL will have you believe that, but that is simply not the truth.

Oh and you support ISIS by the way - US funded and back terrorist organisation, and would only be US funded and backed is Israel allowed the US to do so.....