Is the BBC right to pull the DEC Gaza Appeal?

2378546 — Mon, 26 Jan 2009 10:33:00 GMT

This weekend the BBC DG Mark Thompson announced the corporation's refusal to air an appeal for the victims of Gaza, saying it would compromise the BBC’s hard-fought stance of editorial impartiality. Today, Sky followed suit. When questioned, Editor-in-Chief Thompson said he believed there was no political motivation behind the Appeal and that the public could distinguish between a humanitarian Appeal and a political message.

But, contrarily and uncomprehendingly, he still insisted that the BBC would be sending the wrong signal to the public if they went ahead and broadcast the Appeal. His reasons for doing so still require an adequate explanation. In the absence of which, here's one. Post-Hutton timidity. Many of the individual charities who form the DEC are on the ground in Gaza in places like Beit Lahia in the north and Rafa in the south and therefore well placed to take advantage of the fragile ceasefire. For the half a million people in Gaza who have not had access to clean water since the conflict began, this ceasefire is a humanitarian window. No one knows how long it ceasefire will hold - when or if Hamas will renew their rocket attacks into Southern Israel and how long it would then take for Israeli tanks to renew their pounding of 'Hamas positions'. So much is unclear, the fog of war is still thick on the ground.

But one truth is undeniable. Once again, it’s children who are caught in the crossfire. Children. And they know no political context, have no hatred in their hearts, assume no pretence of moral authority, exert no right to retribution. All they know is raw fear, hunger and pain. Surely we can apply the word ‘impartiality’ to an Appeal focused on Innocents. To quote one charity's programme manager who has been working on the ground in Gaza throughout the conflict, “Children are terrified by what they hear, by the bombs. They see the dead. The number of traumatised children is increasing rapidly.” Like Thompson, programme workers such as these and the NGOs they represent also hold sacrosanct the rule of impartiality in areas of conflict.

Like the BBC, it’s not an indulgence, a question of high principle or integrity. It's about survival. Without adopting an impartial position, they would neither gain access to the dying, the suffering, the bereaved and the traumatised nor would they themselves be secure. You can’t help feeling that Thompson’s stand is a kick in the guts to humanitarian and developmental charities who have themselves striven to maintain an impartial standpoint to save lives and rehabilitate people whose worlds have been torn apart by internecine political unrest. Mark Thompson’s judgment call comes almost five years to the day since the resignations of Gavin Davies and Greg *** following Government criticism and pressure on the organisation over the Hutton Report . Remember it? It was headlined as 'the biggest crisis in the 82-year history of the BBC'. It prompted BECTU and the NUJ to challenge any attempts to curb the independence of the organisation. One journalist went on record as saying “Any news organisation has to be seen as impartial to be credible and that is what we are fighting for”.

It's strange how these events have paled since then, slipped into our collective unconsciousness. But they're still all too real when it comes to the separation of State and an independent BBC - and they've re-emerged in the wake of Thompson's announcement. You really can’t help but sense the legacy of Hutton in the refusal to broadcast the DEC Gaza Appeal, that the top brass at the BBC has learned little since ***’s departure – that impartiality is merely a cloak for their lack of courage. Something I’m glad to say can’t be said of BBC journalists or NGOs who are every minute of every day struggling to establish a lifeline amid the rubble of Gaza.

BBC made right call over Gaza

255762 — Mon, 26 Jan 2009 09:19:00 GMT

The BBC has made the right call over its decision not to broadcast the Gaza appeal. This is supported by Sky News doing likewise. The BBC should stick to the decision it has made and not be brow beaten into changing its mind.

Gaza is a highly emotive issue, everyone knows that, but it isn't the BBC's job to broadcast charity footage seeking to raise funds for the DEC emergency appeal in Gaza. Furthermore it doesn't need to.

Broadcasting the appeal would put the BBC's impartiality at risk and no matter how much groups march and MPs attack it should not back down.

The BBC's job is to report the news and to cover the story in Gaza as it continues to unfold. It will as a matter of its ongoing reporting give airtime to the humanitarian dimensions of what is a complicated and contentious story. That is its job.

That alone gives easy access to information to those who might choose to donate to the DEC appeal. It is not as if the issue is hard to miss. It is everywhere. People can not fail to be informed or find information easily online.

That to me suggests quite strongly that this issue is not really about the appeal itself, but about political bullying which the BBC should not give into.

We can see more of that bullying in the people who are pressing the issue most keenly. These people are themselves not impartial. The Labour MP Richard Burden who is putting forward an early day motion, supported by more than 50 MPs, is chairman of the House of Commons Britain-Palestine All Party Parliamentary group. He campaigns tirelessly and in a one sided fashion on this issue.

Other Parliamentarians supporting his cause include Jewish Labour MP Gerald Kaufman who spends his time, equally tirelessly, attacking Israel at any opportunity. His choice words for this issue? The BBC is worrying about "nasty pressure" from some pro-Israeli lobbyists. He has a history of this and recently compared the actions of Israeli troops in Gaza to the jackbooted Germans who forced his family to flee Poland. He's a man in need of a level head.

BBC director general Mark Thompson has said that the BBC can not give the impression it was "backing one side" over the other. That is exactly right. Many already suspect that this is the case anyway – although I am no one of them.

He is entirely right in doing so. Whatever else you think about the decisions he had made recently this is the right one and he deserves some support for this.

If it is to broadcast the footage of Gaza then what about the victims in Israel as well? Should we also get images of those killed or maimed there? As it is important to remember that there are two sides to this story. It is not the BBC's job to broadcast charity appeals whatever the merits, but particularly when it comes to issues like this that are so divisive.

I don't believe that he BBC's arm has been twisted by pro-Israeli lobbyists, but then I am not some conspiracy minded loon either. I don't think the BBC would or should bow down to them anymore than it should to the pro-Palestinian lobby.

I also find it entirely bizarre the argument that some are putting forward that the BBC must give in and broadcast the appeal less it give rise to the argument that the corporation will be seen to be under the influence of "Zionists". That is one hell of a slippery slope.

If that argument is used as even part of the thinking for the broadcast to go ahead then that would be entirely shameful as it is nothing short of appeasement and giving into the worst kind of bullying. And that can not be allowed to stand under any circumstance.

The truth of the matter several days into this storm is that the row alone has achieved more publicity than broadcasting the appeal ad ever would. Job done. Now let's move on.

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Is the BBC right to pull the DEC Gaza Appeal?

BBC made right call over Gaza