Following up on the last post, I just came across this interview with Tim Llewellyn was the BBC’s Middle East correspondent twice from 1976 - 1982 and from 1987 - 1992. It’s sheds more light on BBC Biased story telling and the reasons behind it. Here is some excerpts from the interview:

… “Since then, with suicide bombings and 9/11, this whole alleged “war on terrorism” has made it much more difficult for Palestinians to have their case heard properly. I don’t think the institutional press like the BBC, which is terribly important in this country … I don’t think it has got the nerve to tell the story the way it is. It’s nervous about its own survival as an institution. It does not want to be seen to be implying that it is condoning the violence that is going on; on the Palestinian side … They are adopting what they see as an even handed attitude. To me this is a cowardly attitude, it is an attitude which confuses occupier with occupied …”

…”BBC reporting doesn’t tell the story. I don’t mean that it doesn’t tell the story from a particular point of view. It doesn’t tell the story: Which is that the Palestinians are occupied and are fighting for independence in the same way that practically every other developing country was fighting for independence in the 30 years after the Second World War … The very fact that there is an occupation is a provocation. The very fact that the Palestinians are not being allowed to live in freedom in their own state, their own society, they have not got self-determination. And that not only that, but that the occupation is being increased and widened. These are very important matters. In any other situation, in the Balkans or in Africa, the BBC would be reporting this story in a very different way”.

… “The BBC are nervous about the pressures they are under, they’re nervous about the complaints they get, they’re nervous about upsetting Tony Blair; they’re nervous about their own future as an institution. They don’t want to be seen as rocking the boat. First of all, the Israeli pressure is enormous and of course with that can easily come hints that if you report the story properly, you can be accused of anti-Semitism. These kinds of charges can be made. There is an emotive quality to the Jewish fate in European society, which can easily be played upon. So the BBC is very nervous”.

But didn’t all these issues exist before 2000? I asked Llewellyn.

“They’ve been reemphasised since the second Palestinian intifada because of the violence involved; because of 9/11; because of the Hutton Enquiry; because of all sorts of things; Britain’s involvement with the United States in Iraq. Our new stance in the world. Our new imperialist outlook. Its made everybody a lot more sensitive. The Blair Government is much more pro-Israeli than any previous Government. It is much more inclined not to rock the boat about Israel”.

The BBC is not independent in the sense that it’s financed by the British Government which gets its money compulsorily from taxpayers (i.e. license payers). As we have seen the Government can change its Charter or revoke its Charter if it wants to. It hasn’t done yet. Maybe it won’t. But it can reduce its license fee, reduce its funding. So even though the BBC is editorially independent, like any institution, it has to think carefully about how it behaves. Shock waves went through the BBC after the Hutton Enquiry. All these things, have contributed to a feeling of corporate nervousness about, I think, dealing with sensitive political issues and Israel is a sensitive political issue. It’s not like dealing with South Africa or Serbia or Kosovo or Bosnia or Sierra Leone or Rwanda”.

“If there is an area of sensitivity in which they know the Government is sensitive about, the BBC will be sensitive about it as well. I think this is new. This has all come to a head in the last 4 years since the Al-Aqsa intifada. It’s really changed. The nature of BBC reporting from Israel has become much more tepid; much less authoritative. Reporters on the ground are under pressure. No doubt about it. If they have not been told directly, they have inferred from what their bosses say to them; the way stories are chosen”.

[...]

I then asked Llewellyn about the media’s fascination with the “suicide bomber” and of BBC reporting in general. I asked him whether he thought it would be a good idea if more BBC correspondents actually lived with Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza; in Nablus, Ramallah and Bethlehem for example, rather then in West Jerusalem.

“The problem with suicide bombings … it’s never been explained properly, as to why it happens and what provokes them, because people are afraid that if they try to do that - and you have the example of Jenny Tonge (and it might be added Mrs. Blair) - they are condoning them (Jenny Tonge is a British politician with the Liberal democrats). And again, we come back to the “war on terror”; that people are very nervous about saying anything that could possibly be construed as advocating blowing up civilians. This isn’t to say that it is a good idea or that it’s never helped the Palestinians in the long run, but again it’s the lack of context of why these things happen and the profiles of the people that do them. Quite often people that carry out these acts are people who have suffered at the hands of the Israeli occupation in the most ghastly circumstances. But we don’t hear that side of the story, certainly not in the BBC’s or ITV’s main news bulletin. The contexts of these attacks are terribly important … I think the Western media, because they are based in Jerusalem, tend to see the things from the Israeli side. The violence becomes something the Israelis can capitalize on …”

Llewellyn told me that the BBC lost a lot of good reporters during the change over in 2000: “They need some people in the Middle East with more authority than they have at the moment. The reporting is pretty bad. They lost a lot of good reporters in 2000. It was just unfortunate. Those people’s contracts had come to an end. I thought the reporting was perfectly OK throughout the 1990s but it really suffered a lot of damage with the change over in 2000. New people came in who didn’t understand the Middle East. A lot of them still don’t seem to understand it. One or two are better then others; It’s not a strong team … The BBC really ought to have more reporting from the Palestinian side. I’ve suggested it to the BBC. You really must have people living with the Palestinians - to explain what is actually happening there - rather than dipping in and out of these places everyday and then going back to the comfort, the pressures of West Jerusalem. And of course the Israelis use their pressure. They’ve denied people visas and threatened to withdraw visas for the Bureau Chiefs there”.

[...]

The conversation then turned to Barbara Plett, a BBC Middle East correspondent who had got into spot of controversy, when she showed emotion at Arafat’s funeral. In the programme: “From our Own Correspondent” Plett had said, “…when the helicopter carrying the frail old man rose above his ruined compound, I started to cry… without warning. In quieter moments since I have asked myself, why the sudden surge of emotion?” I wondered whether it had been “unprofessional” for Plett to show emotion at Arafat’s funeral and I posed the question to Llewellyn.

“No … I don’t think it would have been a problem if it was a helicopter carrying the body of Tito or a Western Leader like Winston Churchill …” Before Llewellyn could continue, I interrupted him again pointing out that had it been Ariel Sharon, and not Yasser Arafat on that helicopter, some people would have been offended at her remarks.

“You’ve got to remember what the programme was. It was a programme in which correspondents are allowed to talk about their own feelings and their own actions. I personally wouldn’t have used the form of words she used but I don’t see why she should have been excoriated. I know a lot of my BBC colleagues disagree with me. I think she was in a particular situation, at a particular time, and she found it moving. I don’t think she should have been reprimanded. If someone had been at Rabin’s funeral, which was attended, if you recall, by King Hussein and Yasser Arafat; if a reporter, at that funeral found it emotional, I don’t know, I would probably have to accept that was what the guy felt at the time. It was a moving experience. It was the circumstances. I don’t think Ariel Sharon is comparable. His record is not one that would induce tears”.

Full interview available at EI

Palestine