For six decades now the Western media has conspired with Israel regarding the crimes it perpetrates against the Palestinians and the wars it fights against the Arabs. In the current decade it has conspired with the Bush administration against Iraq (the war against Taliban and al-Qaeda in Afghanistan was and still is justified). The difference between one daily and another, or between a quarterly and another, is the magnitude of the conspiracy. Liberal dailies which support Israel and feel shame try sometimes to be fair to the victim. As for the right-wing media, particularly the Likudist, it is an accomplice in terms of instigation, endorsement, and defense, as if it killed women and children with its editors' pens. There are always heroes. Since I can only give examples in this quick discussion, I will content myself with naming three Jewish journalists: Amira Hass from Haaretz, Susan Goldberg from The Guardian, and Deborah Sontag from The New York Times. Their coverage of al-Aqsa Intifada after 29/9/2000 is among the best in the world, and better than the coverage provided by many Arab journalists. The European press enjoys more freedom than its American counterpart, but is not totally innocent. Israel, the Jewish lobby in Washington, and the other Likudist mobs can form a pressure group to target any publication and pose a threat to its income from ads. What is worse than all the above is the US Congress with its seemingly unattainable achievement. For the Palestinians, Arabs, and Muslims everywhere, it is more aggressive than the Israeli Knesset. Indeed, it has almost unanimously supported every war and crime perpetrated against the Arabs, including the summer 2006 war on Lebanon and the December-January war on the Gaza Strip. On the other hand, any similar vote in the Knesset shows a higher rate of opposition to any war on the Arabs. However, Congress deserves a separate study; therefore, I content myself with the media and move from America to Britain - and to the BBC in particular. The name of the BBC is almost synonymous with trust in objectivity and accuracy in news reporting. This is the case with every cause except the Palestinian's which has for years been subjected to the dictates of the Israeli lobby. The case of Jeremy Bowen, the BBC Middle East editor, proves the blatant bias in favor Israel at the expense of women and children's lives. To borrow an expression from a popular fairy tale, the world press emperor is naked. The BBC Trust accused Bowen of breaching internal professional guidelines on accuracy and impartiality, but I accuse the Trust of being biased towards Israel, and of ignorance and cowardice. Yet, no matter what I say about the Trust, I cannot outdo prominent journalist Robert Fisk who wrote on April 16 in The Independent a comment on Bowen's case headlined "Why the BBC Is Cowardly, Dishonest and Wrong" in which he affirmed that the Trust is the mouthpiece of the Israeli lobby which was unfair to Bowen. The BBC, which recalled accuracy and impartiality last month, is the same entity that had refused to make the Gaza appeal in January - although it was for humanitarian aid - and had come under assault from the Right and the Left for its cowardice. The Arab Media Watch (AMW) analyzed the coverage and published a report that was documented with dailies material, articles, and dates. We read that for over ten days the BBC stance was supported in 10 articles and opposed in 26. The Arab Media Watch monitors the British media coverage of Arab causes under the chairmanship of Sharif Nashashibi, along with a group of young people dedicated to establishing the truth. I need to go back with the Arab Media Watch to 2006 to prove with those young people that the BBC, like its Trust, is lying to itself and to people. In 2005 the BBC decided to examine the magnitude of its objectivity in covering the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and hence commissioned an independent panel, the Communications Research Centre at Loughborough University, and British-Israeli international lawyer Noam Lubell to produce a report. The BBC also invited independent organizations, including Arab Media Watch to follow up the issue. In sum, the report produced by the Communications Research Centre concluded that the BBC is not fair to the Palestinians, that it heavily relies on Israeli sources, and that its coverage of Israeli news is obvious. The Arab Media Watch came up with similar findings in its independent study. I have the two reports in case anyone wishes to read them, and they are worth publishing three years after their release, with a view to denouncing the BBC. If this is what the most important source of news in the West has reached, then it is no wonder that all the Western media has fallen, along with the BBC. Al-Hayat 10-05-2009 http://www.j-khazen.blogspot.com/
