Guest post from a reader: on Gaza, fundraisers, and prejudice

Protestors demonstrate against the BBC's decision in London. Credit: Frantzesco Kangaris/Agence France-Presse

Protesters demonstrate against the BBC in London. Credit: Frantzesco Kangaris/Agence France-Presse

A reader who works for the BBC wrote to ask if I planned to post about her employers’ decision against broadcasting a fund raising appeal for Gaza. The Beeb based its decision on the concern that broadcasting the appeal while the story was ongoing would give the impression of bias. John Burns of the New York Times summarizes the ensuing controversy here.

Anyway, I responded to this reader’s query by observing that I hadn’t really been following the controversy very closely, even though I knew it was a huge story in the UK. Privately, I thought it sounded shrill, polarizing and unnecessary. And even more privately I thought, “Eh, the Brits are so eccentric. After all, they eat yeast paste on white bread for breakfast. Eechs. And besides that, imagine thousands marching on the streets of London if the Beeb refused to broadcast a fundraiser for East Timor, Congo or Sri Lanka. Ha!”

So I suggested that this reader might be interested in writing a guest post for this blog. Below is her response, which I am publishing with permission. The reader’s name is witheld for obvious reasons.

Oh, two more things: Sky news also decided against broadcasting the appeal; and in the end, the Disasters Emergency Committee (DEC) raised GBP 3 million – even though the money might never actually end up helping the people of Gaza.

***

Hi Lisa

Truth be told, I’m reluctant to write about it because: (a) I do not proclaim to be a writer – nor a decent one at that and (b) although I understand the decision not to air the appeal and, to a degree, stand by the decision, I’m still unsure whether or not it was the right decision in the long run. The argument that the Director General puts forth is that it’s a continuing news story and by broadcasting an emotional appeal on a news channel with harrowing images, it might appear that the BBC was “taking sides”. In addition, management was not convinced that the funds raised would reach the victims and those in need. And yet, by not broadcasting it, the BBC has been denounced as pro-Israel/ anti-Palestine and taking sides.

Just as a side note: this isn’t the first time that an appeal was rejected by the BBC. In 2006, the BBC rejected an appeal for East Africa, again, because they weren’t certain that the funds would reach the victims.

I don’t mean to sound like a PR piece for the BBC and as I said, although I understand the decision I can’t say with 100 percent certainty that it is the right one.

What does piss me off, however, is that this tragic war and the BBC’s refusal (as well as Sky’s refusal) to air the appeal, seems to have been hijacked by and turned into yet another example of how evil they perceive Israel to be. Or how “powerful Jews” lobby and influence broadcasters. Every day, I am emailed viewer’s comments about our programmes and recently, I’m particularly astonished at people objecting to a presenter on a children’s show (“Blue Peter“), who is rediscovering his Jewish roots. The comments are too depressing to reiterate.

I should probably note that I’m not Jewish (or Christian- never even been baptized!) but rather, just another person who wants peace in the Middle East.

Also, perhaps it’s my Canadian upbringing (and thus hyper sense of political correctness), but I am regularly shocked at how anti-Israel (anti-Jewish? I don’t know), Europe and Europeans can be. Not anti-Olmert/current politicians – but out and out ANTI-ISRAEL. And even though I identify as someone who is left-wing, I always seem to find myself isolated when it comes to that old debate that everyone and their dog has an opinion about – i.e. Israel’s right to exist.

Sorry to have gone on about this, I guess I’m just tired of walking past the protests outside my work and having “shame” screamed at me for something out with my control. It’s been cathartic though!

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10 Comments so far (Add 1 more)

Well personally I wasnt too keen to jump on the beeb’s tail (as you put it), because when it comes to the palestinian issue, they do stand out among western media to a certain extent, and their reports go to great lengths to show the sufferings of the palestinians. I think a certain Alan Johnston would ring a few bells! But the brutality of the war on gaza, coupled with a wide spread anger among muslims and non-muslims in the UK made the BBC’s decision seem very biased and inhumane to a certain extent. Im pretty sure that had it been some British former colony under question, matters wouldve been slightly different!

1. Firas Kay
on February 2nd, 2009 at 12:12 am
I’ve been following the story…on the BBC World Service that covered itself extensively. Despite hearing lots of information about this issue, I couldn’t manage to obtain an opinion.
Pushing the BBC to air the appeal, made it choose between two sides: either air the appeal and appear pro-Palestinian, or refuse and appear pro-Israeli.
They kind of had their back to the wall – no matter what decision they made, they would be accused by the other side.

2. Yohay
on February 2nd, 2009 at 12:26 am
Firas Kay -

Palestine *was* a British colony – from the end of WWI until 1948! Are you joking, or do you simply not know that Palestine was under the British Mandate for that period?

3. Rebecca
on February 2nd, 2009 at 12:45 am
I’m temporarily living here in London, and let me tell you it’s been absolute hell on Earth to be Jewish in London over the past few weeks. I was really hopeful that with the ceasefire the protests would end and we could all go back to our normal life (and I could return to areas of the city that I’d been avoiding for fear of gross bodily harm…like High Street Ken). The protests have continued, and they don’t seem to be letting up.

I think something had to be done about the rockets, but I question the wisdom of what was done. It doesn’t appear to have been effective. However, the people here don’t stop to ask you for your opinion before they start harassing you or, in some cases, beating you.

A Tesco delivery van driver was beat up. Tescos commits the crime of selling Israeli fruits and veggies when they’re in season. For this, their delivery driver…who probably wasn’t Jewish and who might not even have been delivering Israeli fruits and veggies…was beaten. This is what the UK has come to.

4. Elianah
on February 2nd, 2009 at 11:27 am
Elianah: I live in London and do not feel physically threatened, I am at SOAS (well known for its left wing political bent) and am in the Jewish society and the Israel society. I feel extremely annoyed by various kinds of idiotic behaviour but would feel safe going anywhere in London that I would normally consider safe. I have discussed this with a lot of people from shul and other places, and I have come across few people who feel personally in any danger. Obviously this is quite a personal thing and I’m not suggesting that there is anything wrong with the way you feel about living in London right now, but I don’t think it is necessarily representative of Jewish Londoners.

5. Sarah
on February 2nd, 2009 at 1:39 pm
Rebecca, but Palestine was never part of the British empire at any point! Sure the Sykes-Picot Agreement meant that the British would mandate some of the Arab lands, but it was never looked at as a colonial matter, and besides even if it was, one might argue that the Balfour promise and later Lloyd George’s extremely favorable attitude towards the Zionist movement meant that the Brits were only temporarily in Palestine until the Zionist movement was strong enough to get its plan into action!

As for the Tesco matter, that’s just wrong, although you hear it a lot that Tesco’s, like Marks & Spenser’s who have Jewish origins support Israel, but that doesn’t mean of course that the Tesco’s driver should be beaten!

6. Firas Kay
on February 2nd, 2009 at 5:53 pm
@Rebecca & @Firas,

Rebecca, apologies but Firas indeed sunk your battleship with this one.

I’m not a lawyer, but Palestine under a League of Nations’ Mandate didn’t qualify as a colony in the traditional (read: British Imperial, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, or German — pre-WWI) sense. Bolstering Palestine’s case as a non-colony non-occupied state was that the Redcoats were not in Holy Palestine to plunder, rape, and pillage its land, although the Poms’ proximity to both Arabia’s and Iran’s oil fields might take the wind out of my argument’s sails.

As for the beat-ons going on in the Disunited Kingdom — I’m sure it’s not a widespread phenomenon (@Elianah), but it kind of makes me thank Providence that I live in an enlightened, civilized EU Member State known to many as the Czech Republic and to some as former Czechoslovakia. Who would have thunk it that a post-Communist nation would qualify for such an honour?

More pragmatically, all this shows how myopic (there’s that word again!) and capricious Western Europeans have been with their ill-conceived immigration policies, and how the Eastern European countries are looking at their western cousins in shock and dismay, doing everything in their political power to delay the day when they, too, will be required to shoulder their burden of the EU migration and asylum load. New migrants to my part of the world might eventually include newcomers from the Muslim world, and perhaps then the protests won’t be limited to the UK, France, Germany, etc.

Lisa, as for your poster’s referencing her “Canadian-ness” as the reason for her tendency toward “hyper political correctness” — I dunno, the both of us are Canadian and we’re not politically correct at all, so what gives?! Since Israelis and Jews don’t like pernicious stereotypes made about themselves, I’m now officially going to take issue with your poster’s sweeping generalizations about Canadians, citing potential discrimination against my people. It offends my Canadian sense of fairness that she’d lop me into some amorphous mass known as the “Canadian hyper politically correct” crowd.

There, I said it.

7. Adam Daniel Mezei
on February 3rd, 2009 at 11:39 pm
I know this is off point, but Lisa, I just had to address your comment: “Eh, the Brits are so eccentric. After all, they eat yeast paste on white bread for breakfast.”

Only the totally insane eat Marmite (which is what I assume you are talking about)… and as for white bread…

; )

8. Nic
on February 9th, 2009 at 2:53 pm
nice job, very thanks

9. Kindrea Pulley
on July 3rd, 2009 at 8:43 am
@Rebecca, @Firas, @Adam,

Palestine was a mandate, you are correct Adam. However, maybe you do not know this (and I know it’s been half a year since your discussion here, but feel compelled to post), nonetheless, one of the proposed plans of dividing the Palestinian mandate was the work of the Peel Commission, which proposed not only dividing the land into two states, but also proposed retaining Jerusalem, Bethlehem, and Nazareth under the Mandate with a territorial link between the coast and Jerusalem-Bethlehem area without a day to relinquish it. In addition to that, guess where in modern Israel there’s an end to an old oil pipe running from Iraq? Haifa. There is a refinery there, which the Brits used to get Iraqi oil. So, suggesting that the Mandate was different than a colony is imho historically inaccurate (although you get credit for being close and saying Iran).

As for the Firas’ remark about Lloyd George’s government, that’s a riot in itself. He was actually in government from 1916-1922, after that date pretty much sitting in Parliament (not the Cabinet), but even that with a break. And it’s interesting also, how a number of British White Papers are also completely excluded from this conversation, the White Papers, may I add, which doomed a large part of European Jews to certain death in ghettos and concentration camps, because they limited Jewish immigration into the mandate territory. For example, the White Paper of 1939 limited Jewish immigration to 75,000 over the next 5 years.

@Adam re: Czech Republic being civilized – have you ever asked Czech Roma what they think about Czech Republic being civilized?

@Elianah and Sarah, as an American, who was in Paris in the beginning of January, I was simply appalled at the number of attacks against Jewish Centers and synagogues that were reported to have taken place all over France over my week-long stay in Paris. I mean are Molotov cocktails what the Jews should be expecting in Europe? And in general, walking by a synagogue in Paris was depressing – it had a cement front, with ridiculously thin windows (like in the Medieval castles, to be used for shooting at the outsiders) and a set of fences in front. Such a contrast to the way American synagogues are. It was scary and sad, as a general testament of what Jews in France have to think about when they build their synagogues.

10. ququ for cocoa puffs
on July 4th, 2009 at 4:18 am