Israel and the BBC

12 thoughts on “Israel and the BBC”

1. This has to be some kind of practical joke, right? The BBC is intensely hostile to Israel and Israeli interests, and for these “researchers” in Glasgow to suggest that this organization “substantially features Israeli government views” when Israeli government officials are, 1) Not invited to speak at all in most cases, and 2) boycotting the BBC because of reason no. 1, is simply not credible. I am deeply familiar with the BBC myself, and they have always followed a one-sided, pro-Arab editorial line in their coverage of the middle east. Incidentally, his has only grown worse over the past several years as the Palestinian onslaught has grown in fervor and hateful intensity. Perhaps this has to do with the public pressure on the BBC to contribute to the delegitimization of Israel we see being attempted all over Europe.

2. I am not surprised either, in the Netherlands the same thing happends.
   But people who are very pro-Israel are very aware of every bit of critisism and perceive things differently.
   There should be more objective counting, since that is the only way to really settle this differend perception.

3. David, you saying these things without providing any data doesn’t make them true, or you credible. The Glasgow folks have compiled and analyzed the relevant data. If you spoke to that your comments would be more relevant and you more credible.

4. Norman Geras’ preliminary comments on the study’s methodological flaws. I’d add to this that determining bias based on factors such as the raw number of Israeli politicians interviewed is problematic, because it doesn’t account for the viewpoints of the Israelis in question or the tone of the interviewers. Certainly, in my years of reading and listening to the BBC, I’ve never detected a pro-Israel bias (although I also haven’t been as quick as others to detect an anti-Israel bias).

5. Now that I’m somewhat more coherent and have had more time to consider, I have a few more thoughts:

   1. The fact that more Israelis than Palestinians were interviewed does not, without more, prove that BBC coverage is biased in favor of “official Israeli perspectives.” For instance, who are these Israelis? How many of them support the government and how many are opposition figures and/or peace activists? Were Azmi Bishara and Ahmed Tibi, both of whom have been interviewed by the BBC, counted among the Israelis? In short, do the Israelis who appear on the BBC represent a range of opinion, or are they all assumed by the survey takers to represent “official perspectives?”
      Also, did the survey takers rule out other reasons why so many Israelis might appear – for instance, the greater range of public debate in Israel as compared to the PA? Did they account for the tone of the interviews – i.e., were pro-government Israelis questioned more or less sympathetically than pro-resistance Palestinians? Likewise with the American politicians – were they brought onto the BBC to pontificate in favor of Israel or to discuss American diplomatic initiatives in the Middle East? And could it be that the reason American politicians appear more often than British politicians is simply that the United States conducts more ME diplomacy than Britain does?
      It’s impossible to measure bias by counting heads without knowing the answers to these questions – and your executive summary of the survey doesn’t provide them.
   2. This finding is problematic for at least two reasons. First, it’s a stretch to assume that gaps in viewers’ historical knowledge are a result of media bias. The primary subject of the survey is the BBC’s coverage of news – i.e., things that are new. The BBC is not obligated to do the job of the schools, and there’s no particular reason to append a dissertation on the history of the Middle East to every report about an IDF raid or suicide bombing. It certainly doesn’t do this with respect to any other topic, and I’m not sure why the survey takers expect the BBC to provide a comprehensive historical education with respect to this subject only.
      Second, as Norman Geras points out, it’s unlikely that the viewers are all ignorant of facts that support the Palestinian narrative but fully up to speed on those that support the Israeli case. Did the survey takers inquire, for example, as to whether the viewers are aware of the 1929 Hebron massacre, the Arab rejection of Resolution 181, the infiltrations of the 1950s, Syrian shelling of northern Israel from the Golan in 1966-67, Jordan’s entry into the Six Day War, the Yom Kippur war, Rabin’s peace initiatives and/or the Camp David and Taba proposals? Did they attempt to link the viewers’ knowledge and/or ignorance of these events to the BBC’s news coverage?
      This finding doesn’t pass the smell test. I strongly suspect that the survey takers began with an assumption that an impartial and informed viewer would know and support the Palestinian narrative, and interpreted the evidence accordingly. That says a good deal more about them than about the BBC.
   3. This, again, is a matter of interpretation rather than historical fact, and depends a great deal on one’s view of what “started” the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Did it begin in 1967 or 1948 (or some even earlier time), or did Oslo and the second intifada reset the clock? If 1967 is the baseline for what’s happening now, was it a war of Israeli aggression, one of self-defense or a combination of both? The answers one gives to all these questions will affect one’s view of whether Israeli actions are reactive. I have strong personal opinions as to the historical background of the I-P conflict, but I certainly wouldn’t condemn news coverage as “biased” merely because it doesn’t reflect my favored narrative.
      From what I’ve seen of BBC coverage – and I’ve seen a good deal – particular acts are characterized as retaliatory when there is some evidence that they are. Reactive IDF raids are characterized as retaliatory while proactive raids aren’t; Palestinian attacks are generally characterized as retaliatory when the perpetrators claim them as such. That seems more like good reporting than bias to me. It could simply be that Israeli acts are more likely to be characterized as reactive because more of them are reactive.
      Again, I think the survey takers’ conclusion that the “contextualization” of Israeli actions “apparently influenced many viewers to blame Palestinians for the conflict” says more about them than about the BBC. The obvious implication is that they don’t think an informed viewer would blame the Palestinians, which is a reflection of their own biases.
   4. I can’t really speak to this conclusion without knowing the particular reports referenced by the survey takers. I do have to wonder if they’re describing the same BBC with which I’m familiar, though; I can’t recall any coverage that was sympathetic to the settlers, and certainly not to the settlement movement as such.
   5. There are several possible reasons why Israeli casualties might get more coverage than Palestinian casualties. For instance, Israeli casualties generally occur in job lots as a result of spectacular events, while Palestinian casualties result from such events less often. An impartial journalist, not biased toward either side, might still consider a suicide bombing more newsworthy than an al-Aqsa or Islamic Jihad militant being killed in a shootout with the IDF. A month in which, say, six Israelis are killed in a single bus bombing and 15 Palestinians are killed in separate shootouts around the WB and Gaza might produce more coverage of the Israeli casualties, but I’d hesitate to consider this evidence of bias.
      In my admittedly unscientific experience, Palestinian casualties are heavily reported when they result from an activity as spectacular as a suicide bombing – for instance, the Baruch Goldstein massacre or the recent Rafah invasion. In addition, complaints about greater coverage of Israeli casualties smack somewhat of a double standard. One of the primary objects of a terrorist attacks, such as a sucide bombing, is to cause terror and to bring attention to the attackers’ cause, neither of which can be realized without publicity. In other words, the Palestinian factions carry out attacks in such a way as to create maximum publicity and then complain about bias when this publicity actually occurs.
      As for the unequal use of the word “terrorist,” it’s been my experience that the BBC uses the Reuters convention (i.e., “militant”) to describe Palestinians who carry out attacks. Also, the comment about Kahanist terrorists who attempted to bomb a school being called “extremists” cuts both ways – how often are attempted bombings by Palestinians covered at all? In the time I’ve paid attention to the BBC, I can only recall one – the child who turned himself in at a checkpoint – and the BBC coverage didn’t describe him as a terrorist.

   If I were a Scottish judge, I’d have to label the case “not proven.” It may be that the BBC is biased one way or another, but this survey certainly isn’t proof – and from what I can tell, it is much stronger evidence of the survey takers’ bias than of the BBC’s.
   Actually, Helena, you seem like the perfect subject for a non-scientific test. You are very familiar with the BBC, you’ve spent a great deal of time in Israel and the occupied territories, and you aren’t exactly sympathetic to the Sharon government’s viewpoint. Do you recall any specific BBC stories, concerning events of which you have personal knowledge, that were significantly shaded in favor of Israel, and has this happened often enough in your experience to constitute a pattern? This also wouldn’t be scientific proof of bias or the lack thereof, but I’d be more inclined to take your word than the survey takers’.

6. One more comment and then I’ll shut up:
   Another thing that rings false about the Glasgow survey’s claim that the BBC routinely uses the word “terrorist” to describe Palestinians is the the BBC news director’s specific disavowal of that term. This article is by Barbara Amiel (I know, I know) but it references and specifically quotes from a letter by Richard Sambrook, head of BBC News, to Trevor Asserson:
   

   Sambrook’s reply emphasised the need to “rely on neutral language where the political legitimacy of particular actions is hotly and widely contested”. He told Mr Asserson that “just as you complain when we do not describe groups such as Hamas as terrorists, pro-Palestinian sources complain that to describe them (as we do) as ‘militants’ is derogatory and evidence of an anti-Palestine bias”.

   
   In other words, unless Amiel was misquoting Sambrook, the survey takers’ conclusion regarding the BBC’s use of language is in direct contradiction to the stated policy of the BBC. It could be that BBC reporters routinely violate this policy, but I haven’t seen evidence of this in the coverage I’ve read. Certainly, there has been a great deal of public debate over the BBC’s reluctance to use the word “terrorist” with respect to Palestinian factions, and the BBC has both acknowledged and defended this reluctance. As far as I’m concerned, the discrepancy between this and the survey’s findings casts considerable doubt on the survey as a whole.

7. Jonathan, you make some very good points. Regarding my impressions of the BBC’s international newscasts, I’d say the following:
   (1) I think I agree with you–and Barbara Amiel– on the Beeb’s (non-)use of the term “terrorist” on the international newscasts. It is quite possible that they have used it in their domestic newscasts, though the Sambrook letter does suggest that the Beeb has a blanket policy against its use.
   (2) I do think the Beeb, like many, many media in the west, has a tendency to describe things in the way the study says: i.e. Palestinian violence is followed by “retaliatory” Israeli violence. In good part, this is because of the limited way in which most western journos look at “violence”. In other words, the daily grinding oppression that Palestinians in the o.t.’s suffer and the fact they are under prolonged military law, their lands are seized, their movements controlled, they have no democratic recourse, etc etc– this is not considered “violence” against the Palestinians by most westerners. But most people who have experienced colonial rule would readily recognize that kind of situation as one of structural violence.
   But if it doesn’t bleed, it doesn’t lead… So you get far fewer stories about the grinding-down, daily violence of the occupation as such than you do of phsyical bodies that have been killed or mutilated. (Though the violence of the occupation also leads to deaths and massive diminishment of human life: it’s just harder to SEE.)
   This is not for a moment to excuse either Palestinian violence (or Israeli violence). It is just an attempt to understand how a bunch of well-meaning folks at a place like the Beeb can come out with a meta-narrative in which the “violence” is disproportinately initiated by the Palestinians.
   As for the responsibilities of the media to “educate” viewers/readers, I think all of us often have to take a step back and do a reality check on how much the terms we use are actually understood by readers/viewers. For example, a while back I started audiences when I was speaking what they thought the term “occupation” meant, and would often get a bunch of very blank stares. So I’d back up a couple of steps and explain that “it’s what happens when, in the course of a war, an army ends up for whatever reason controlling land that is not its own; and it’s supposed to be a temporary state of affairs pending a final peace settlement.”
   (On that one, I suspect that post- the US experience in Iraq, more US citizens at least have a clearer idea of what the terms means.)
   So I guess I really do believe that the media have somethng of an educative role to play, yes. That doesn’t mean every news report has to go back to some (totally arbitrary) “beginning” every time. But a little bit of context– historical background, population stats, geography, etc–should definitely be used to make the reporting clear.
   Where does that leave my view of the Beeb, and of this study? Well, I still believe the Beeb, though imperfect in many ways, still provides the best nightly newscast available in the US. (Partly because it is designed as a world news broadcast and has no solely “domestic” component. Who the heck is “Laci Peterson” anyway?) Regarding the Glasgow study, I’d be interested in reading the whole thing, and not just the press release about it that was all I was quoting from.

8. Get a grip you pro-Israeli folks. You want tostop Palestinian suicide bombers, ask the US to supply them withF-16’s and Apache helicopters

9. Interesting points as always, Helena.
   Re the “educative role” of the media: I think this is arguable as an ideal, but the time limitations inherent in television or radio newscasting often make it impractical, especially for a service like BBC that covers the entire world. The Beeb’s reports on Chechnya don’t start with the czars and its reports on Cyprus don’t start with Makarios; I don’t see why it should be taken to task for failing to include such background in its Israel-Palestine reports, and I certainly don’t think this failure supports an accusation of bias.
   News magazine shows and in-depth reporting provide more room for background discussion. To some extent, though, I think news agencies should follow the lead of their viewers in this respect – for instance, if many viewers call in and ask what an occupation is, then it might be wise to provide more background in that area. I also think that much of the educative problem could be solved by allowing the parties to speak for themselves; a Palestinian guest would be more than happy to explain what an occupation is and how it impacts the occupied population, while an Israeli would be equally pleased to explain the ramifications of terrorism. The news agency can provide context to this discussion, but allowing the parties to speak avoids the conflicts of interest that can result when editors select the facts they believe the viewers ought to know.
   Re “structural violence:” I understand the point you’re making, but news media have to speak in the language of their audience. If the BBC were to use the word “violence” to describe the occupation (or “retaliation” to describe violence motivated by a desire to end same), it would have to spend a good deal of time explaining why it is using these words in a way not normally used by the British public. This would not only take away from the time available for factual reporting but would be tantamount to adopting the Palestinian narrative, because it would favor the Palestinian interpretation of the terms “violence” and “retaliation” over the Israeli interpretation. A neutral word like “occupation” is more understandable to the Beeb’s audience while still giving a good idea of what the Palestinians are fighting against. If this use of language is evidence of bias, it is a Western bias rather than a pro-Israeli bias.
   I’d also be interested in reading the whole survey, although if the press releases are the survey takers’ main talking points, I don’t hold out much hope for enlightenment. As I said, I’ve never been as quick as others to ascribe an anti-Israel bias to the Beeb. I’ve seen some BBC coverage that I felt was biased against Israel, other coverage that was quite sympathetic to Israel and a majority of reports that simply presented the facts. At the same time, though, I believe that accusing the BBC of a systemic bias in favor of Israel is patently ridiculous unless one believes that the BBC’s mission is to promote the Palestinian narrative, and I don’t think the job of a news agency is to engage in such polemic.

10. Measuring bias

    I’ve been having an interesting exchange here (check here if the page cuts off at the bottom of the sidebar) about a recent study by two Glasgow University professors purporting to show that BBC news coverage is systemically biased in…

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