Interested folks should do two searchs of BBC online:

1) 'anti-Semitism'+ 'Europe'

2)'anti-Semitism' (or 'Jew hatred' or anything related) and 'Islam' (or 'Arab countries' or 'Muslims' or anything related).

You will find dozens and dozens of article for 1) and almost nothing for 2). (What you will find will make you sick. An article on Egyptian media that claims that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is the cause of anti-Semitic media in Egypt, so (implied) Jews are to blame for it, and apologetics for folks like Mahatir. It is unbelievable.)

And the facts: anti-Semitism (or 'Jew hatred' if you want to avoid the stupid argument that the 'Semite' Arabs cannot hate themselves)in Islam and among Arabs is boiling beyond levels seen in Europe in the 1930s, and the driving CAUSE behind the high tides of Jew hatred in Europe...

What is the BBC doing?

Also, critical open-minded Britians and Europeans should ask themselves these questions:

Could you even imagine the BBC doing a documentary that critically examined the authenticity of the Koran, its historicity, its content in historical content? Could one ever imagine the BBC even interviewing a scholar (who himself or herself would probably not want to come forward publically) who claimed that the Koran was in fact a work of socio-political brainwashing and nothing more?

But couldn't one run such a documentary on any other religious tradition? Aren't Jewish scholars actually on the forefront of critically examining Judaic and Hebrew religious literature in its historical contexts? Can't scholars openly and critically ask the question whether or not Jesus even existed without any problems at all?

The European media (the voice of the 'Churchless state of the EU') is pregnant with critique of everything religious (which for most intellectuals is almost passe because 'God is dead'), but one cannot even IMAGINE critical, historical studies of Islam in the public sphere: What has Europe become? What has the BBC become?...I don't see how liberal-minded Europeans can sleep at night with the knowledge that part of their minds and been reduced to a sick, cowardly silence.

And the price of that silence? Maybe the Jihadis will kill you last.

Posted by: JTF at July 8, 2004 12:40 PM

What will it take for the BBC's coverage of Islam, the Middle East, and Israel, which are of a piece, to be investigated? Does John Simpson's introduction to Operaton Cyanide, the anti-Israel conspiracy-theory book by Peter Hounam (that one-man anti-Israel investigative unit, who when last heard from had been arrested in Israel as a security risk), the anti-Israel and anti-American head of BBC World Service, continue to get a pass, or to pass unnoticed? Why?

What about the hectoring and sneering that is so palpable a feature of interviews with Israeli guests, or those defending Israel, or for that matter a feature of interviews with those defending American policy in Iraq? And the use of the Hamas supporter and promoter Azzam Tamimi, as an "expert" whose views are frequently aired on the BBC? Or the loaded language -- "insurgents" in Iraq, "militants" in Israel, never "terrorists"; "occupied Arab lands" for what are "disputed lands" which are legally unallocated portions of the Mandate for Palestine, set up for the express and sole purpose of establishing the Jewish National Home.

Trevor Asserson has published a number of reports on the BBC. Vladimir Bukovsky, who has that Russian smell-sense (chootyo) for the loaded language and lies in which the BBC, like Pravda of yore, specializes not about all thigns, but specifically about anything remotely to do with Islam, Israel, or the MIddle East, has started a campaign to end the mandatory payment, the license fee, that is exacted to support the BBC, even from those who cannot stand its coverage -- a more sinister attempt than this forced tribute, this jizya, which is used to pay for the very coverage one may find so deceptive and dangerous, is hard to imagine.

Huw Weldon, and Hugh Greene, and many other powerful figures from the intelligent past are missed. And even among the Guardian-reading, left-leaning staff, there are those who, outside of the powerful, tight little group of Arab and Muslim staff and their non-Muslim supporters, hirelings, and hangers-on (some motivated by antisemitic animus, a pathology not to be overlooked or poohpoohed), there must be others on the staff who are aware of this BBC slant, and cannot bear it. Any of them care to reveal what they know, in some tell-it-all revelations about the Islamic equivalent of the Comintern, and its infiltration of the BBC, as of so many other organizations?

It is not up to Blair or Straw to call for a BBC investigation. But others should do it. Donald Watt, Kenneth Minoque, J. B. Kelly, Conor Cruise O'Brien, Bukovsky himself, and others might form a committee, something like the American Committee on the Present Danger, to demand that the BBC coverage be investigated, and without the usual "both sides complain, so we must be doing it right" excuse that is so idiotically offered up by both the BBC, and by PBS when its only slightly less biased coverage is under attack.

Lord Haw-haws and Tokyo Roses now broadcast conveniently right from Bush House and PBS, untouched and seemingly untouchable. And what is even more maddening, they are being paid by British and American taxpayers, respectively. Sentimentality about a free press misses the point. These organizations are self-contained, immune to criticism or oversight (who appointed Dick Gordon, or Tom Ashbrook, to their PBS newsprograms? Was there a poll? Was any audience consulted? Or was it a decision by the very well paid (unlike all other charitable institutions, PBS is very cagy about revealing the salaires of its top management even locally) czarette of WBUR, Jane Christo.

Who appointed her? Who gave her the right to decide who will cover the news for the taxpayer-supported, tax-exempt PBS? And what makes John Simpson exempt from investigation, what makes him permanently immune to being called to account for the outrageous coverage he not only permits but encourages, at the BBC? Both the BBC and PBS, these "publicly-funded" (the BBC by fiat, the PBS by tax-exempt status, grants, and constant handouts from unwary or innocent listeners) that keep pretending this makes them somehow "unbiased" (WBUR keeps telling everyone that it offers a genuine "diversity" of views (sure, it runs all the way from Kerry to Dean, and back), as opposed, those with their hands out for alms to keep their bodies and souls together keep telling us, all those other, crazy right-wing stations that are full of lies.

Spare us.

Posted by: Hugh at July 8, 2004 2:45 PM

Have the Jihadists infiltrated the BBC? One has to ask this question because of items reported.
A splendid example is the Shabina Begum affair and all the furore over the lass being denied her'religious rights.' Not once mentioned was the fact of Hizb ut Tahrir supporting this modest
self efacing damsel in distress. A party piece of Muslim propaganda to portray themselves as 'victims' of the racist West. Another example was the 'highly respected Saudi Iman' opening the new Muslim Centre whose views reflect those of Mister Al Qaradawi at present doing a star act
in the U.K. On both occasions contacted the BBC with these facts but never received a reply.If you take a look at Al Jaz, invented by the same Al
Qaradawi, their propaganda remains the same.Al Qaradawi is described in glowing terms as a positive paragon of virtue, his murderous pro -suicide bombing beliefs carefully omitted. Reminds me of those three monkeys "We see no evil,
hear no evil and speak no evil...'Therefore blind,deaf and dumb.Well, this is some Monkey Business...eh!

Posted by: Morgane at July 8, 2004 7:21 PM