Thursday, February 21, 2013

GUEST POST BY PETER MULLEN


Blog 176
GUEST POST BY PETER MULLEN 
Here’s a fresh piece of balanced and unbiased reporting from the good old BBC. The Corporation’s support for the Palestinian cause and its hatred of Israel admits no impediment, not even when the BBC itself had to admit hiring lawyers at massive cost to the licence-payer to suppress its own report revealing – you wouldn’t believe it – its own bias against Israel.
For its latest trick, the BBC exults over the prospect of an alliance between the two main Palestinian parties, Fatah and Hamas and reports Khaled Meshaal, leader of Hamas as saying:
"We are consulting about forming a government of national accord. Preparations for presidential, parliamentary and executive council elections are under way. We are reinvigorating the Palestine Liberation Organisation and organising its meetings until new national council and executive committee are elected."
This is disingenuous even by the standards of BBC reporting on events in the Middle East. The Corporation consistently urges the resumption of peace talks between the Palestinians and the Israelis but perversely omits to tell us that Hamas opposes this effort for peace because it has publicly and repeatedly committed itself to the destruction of Israel. How are we to imagine that the terrorist organisation Hamas can possibly make common cause with the more reasonable aspirations and policies of Mr Abbas’ Fatah party?
The description of Hamas as terrorists is not my private opinion. Its members and supporters have long been the promoters and perpetrators of acts of terror, slaughter and mayhem. Moreover Hamas is officially designated a terrorist organisation by the US, the UK and even the EU. That’s got them pretty well bang-to-rights in the eyes of the international community. If the BBC’s claim to impartiality were more than posturing and its enthusiasm for peace in the Middle East more than hot air, then surely, in their report of Mr Meshaal’s speech, they would have reminded licence-payers of Hamas’ unreformed terrorist record and ambitions?