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An Anti-Israel BBC Journalist Published a Piece Sympathizing with Hateful UK Group and Terror Suspects
The BBC logo is seen at the entrance at Broadcasting House, the BBC headquarters in central London. Photo by Vuk Valcic / SOPA Images/Sipa USA.
For more than three years, CAMERA UK has been documenting examples of the BBC’s failure to fully inform the British public about the agenda and actions of the radical group calling itself “Palestine Action.”
On November 14, a report was published on the” London” page of the BBC News website under the headline “‘My daughter was branded a terrorist.”. The article — credited to Anna O’Neill of BBC London — opens as follows:
In August, Clare Rogers’ daughter was arrested after allegedly taking part in direct action at an Israeli defence firm near Bristol.
“I discovered, three days in, still no phone call, that she was held under the Terrorist Act. And that meant seven days in solitary, and no right to a phone call… It was shocking,” she said.
Zoe Rogers, 21, is one of a group of pro-Palestinian protesters charged in relation to an incident at the Elbit UK, part of Elbit Systems, a global Israeli defence firm.
Zoe was eventually charged with criminal damage, violent disorder and aggravated burglary and denied bail. Her trial is not set to take place until November 2025.
The link in that third paragraph leads to a BBC Bristol report from August 13, 2024 titled, “Seven appear in court after ram-raid at defence firm,” which provides details of the incident that are absent from O’Neill’s article:
Seven people have appeared in court over a ram-raid on a defence technology firm – with two others held on suspicion of terrorism offences.
A group allegedly used a vehicle to smash through the doors of Elbit Systems UK, near Bristol, in the early hours of 6 August. […]
Police said two officers who attended the incident, on Bolingbroke Way in Patchway, were “seriously assaulted in the course of their duties”.
Extensive damage was caused to the building and employees were allegedly seriously assaulted.
That report describes the charges filed against the two women who are the topic of O’Neill’s report — Zoe Rogers and Fatema Zainab Rajwani — as follows:
Jordan Devlin, 30, of Stoke Newington High Street, London, Leona Kamio, 28, of Clifden Road, Hackney, London and Fatema Rajwani, 20, of Commonside, East Mitcham, Merton, have all been charged with criminal damage, violent disorder and aggravated burglary using a sledgehammer.
Charlotte Head, 28, of White Ash Glade, Caerleon, Newport, and and Zoe Rogers, 20, of Selborne Road, Southgate, Enfield, have also been charged with the same offences.
The same report states:
A 33-year-old man, from Manchester, who was arrested on Friday, also remains in custody on suspicion of the commission, preparation and instigation of acts of terrorism after a warrant of further detention was granted by magistrates.
Another BBC Bristol report published three days later on August 16, under the headline, “Three more charged after ram-raid at defence firm,” provides the name of that “33-year-old man from Manchester”:
Three more people have been charged after an apparent ram-raid at a defence technology firm.
Members of the campaign group, Palestine Action, allegedly used a vehicle to ram the entrance of the Bristol HQ of Elbit Systems on Bolingbroke Way in Patchway, Bristol, shortly before 04:00 BST on 6 August.
Employees at the premises were “seriously assaulted” and “extensive damage” was done to the building, Counter Terrorism Policing South East (CTPSE) said.
The trio have been jointly charged with criminal damage and aggravated burglary.
Ian Sanders, 45, of Regent Place in Royal Leamington Spa, William Plastow, 33, of High Croft Avenue in Manchester and Madeline Norman, 29, of Wester Drylaw Drive in Edinburgh, will appear at Westminster Magistrates’ Court on Friday.
Interestingly, the BBC’s report does not clarify that William Plastow — also known as Will Nyerere Plastow — is (as some have noted was already reported by the Standard in September) a BBC script editor who had participated in previous Palestine Action agitprop in Leicester in April.
Anna O’Neill’s report amply promotes emotional quotes from the mothers of the two women charged with criminal damage, violent disorder, and aggravated burglary, rather than terrorism offences:
The idea of my daughter being branded a terrorist just fills me with horror,” Clare said.
She added: “Someone who believes so passionately in justice, is lamenting the deaths of innocent civilians and children. To be called a terrorist?
“That really disgusts me.
“It makes me very angry and it worries me about the future of activists in this country, and the expression of free speech.” […]
“She is someone who is very loving and very shy,” Clare says of her daughter.
“She thinks very deeply and cares very deeply about social justice. She started to see what was unfolding in Gaza and that became a huge part of her life.”
That “loving and shy” activist is quoted as follows on the ‘Palestine Action’ website:
I am honoured to be imprisoned in solidarity with thousands of Palestinian political prisoners. Down with the apartheid state!
Readers of O’Neill’s report also find a quote from Palestine Action — but no explanation of that organization’s agenda and record of violence and vandalism is provided.
In a statement to the BBC, Palestine Action defended direct action and condemned the use of anti-terror laws.
“Elbit Systems, Israel’s largest weapons producer, market their arms as “battle-tested” on the Palestinian people,” it said.
“By misusing counter-terrorism powers against those who take direct action to shut Elbit down, the state is prioritising the interests of a foreign weapons manufacturer over the rights and freedoms of its own citizens.”
O’Neill also promotes a quote from the NUJ, without explaining its relevance to the story:
And organisations such as the National Union of Journalists (NUJ) are also worried about the use of counter-terror legislation by police.
Michelle Stanistreet, NUJ general secretary, said: “The rise in the use of counter-terror legislation by British police against journalists is alarming and we are concerned recent cases are without clear or sufficient explanation to those under investigation.
“Being able to report freely on issues in the public interest without fear of arrest is a fair expectation for every journalist abiding by the union’s code of conduct. We have urged an end to the apparent targeting for its harm on a free press and the risks posed to both journalists and their sources.”
O’Neill’ goes on to present comments from two lawyers, one of whom is Michael Mansfield. Readers are of course not provided with any information about that contributor’s long-standing anti-Israel activism and collaboration with lawfare campaigns against Israel.
The one-sided nature of O’Neill’s long report, together with her failure to provide readers with relevant context, including that relating to the agenda and actions of Palestine Action, becomes more comprehensible when one is aware of her social media activity.
Apparently the BBC is of the opinion that its obligation to provide its funding public with impartial reporting is not compromised by a puff-piece about members of a violent anti-Israel group which, according to a UK government report, “engages in law breaking and business disruption” (with the help of a BBC script editor) written by a journalist who “likes” social media posts promoting BDS and other anti-Israel content.
Hadar Sela is the co-editor of CAMERA UK — an affiliate of the Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting and Analysis (CAMERA), where a version of this article first appeared.
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Montreal’s Dawson College shut down by student strike in solidarity with Palestine; Concordia remains open despite protests
Dawson College in Montreal shut down classes for almost 10,000 students on Thursday Nov. 21, after students voted 447-247 in favour of a strike to demonstrate solidarity with Gaza. The […]
The post Montreal’s Dawson College shut down by student strike in solidarity with Palestine; Concordia remains open despite protests appeared first on The Canadian Jewish News.
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US ‘Rejects’ ICC Arrest Warrants for Israeli Officials, Lawmakers Vow to Retaliate With Sanctions
The International Criminal Court, The Hague, Netherlands. Photo: Wikimedia Commons.
The US castigated the International Criminal Court (ICC) over its decision on Thursday to issue arrest warrants against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, with lawmakers in Congress promising to seek retribution against the court once President-elect Donald Trump retakes the White House in January.
The ICC rejected an appeal by Israel to dismiss the warrants, instead charging Netanyahu and Gallant with “crimes against humanity and war crimes” in the Gaza conflict. The international body accused the Israeli officials of using “starvation as a method of warfare,” as well as “murder, persecution, and other inhumane acts.” The court also claimed it discovered “reasonable grounds” to slap Netanyahu and Gallant with charges of “intentionally directing an attack against the civilian population.”
Israeli officials vehemently denied the charges, denouncing the ICC’s decision as politically motivated and based on false allegations.
The White House issued a statement condemning the ICC’s announcement.
“The United States fundamentally rejects the court’s decision to issue arrest warrants for senior Israeli officials. We remain deeply concerned by the prosecutor’s rush to seek arrest warrants and the troubling process errors that led to this decision,” White House spokeswoman Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters.
The ICC’s chief prosecutor, Karim Khan, has come under fire for initially making his surprise demand for arrest warrants for Netanyahu and Gallant on the same day in May that he suddenly canceled a long-planned visit to both Gaza and Israel to collect evidence of alleged war crimes. The last-second cancellation infuriated US and British leaders, according to Reuters, which reported that the trip would have offered Israeli leaders a first opportunity to present their position and outline any action they were taking to respond to the war crime allegations.
Rep. Mike Waltz (R-FL), Trump[s pick to serve as his incoming national security adviser, wrote on X/Twitter that the ICC will face a “strong response” when the next administration takes office in January.
“These allegations have been refuted by the US government,” Waltz wrote in a post on X. “Israel has lawfully defended its people & borders from genocidal terrorists. You can expect a strong response to the antisemitic bias of the ICC & UN come January.”
In May, the ICC chief prosecutor officially requested arrest warrants for the Israeli premier, Gallant, and three Hamas terrorist leaders — Yahya Sinwar, Ibrahim al-Masri (better known as Mohammed Deif), and Ismail Haniyeh — accusing all five men of “bearing criminal responsibility” for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity committed in Israel or the Gaza Strip. The three Hamas leaders have since been killed, and Gallant was recently fired as Israel’s defense minister.
US and Israeli officials subsequently issued blistering condemnations of the ICC move, decrying the court for drawing a moral equivalence between Israel’s democratically elected leaders and the heads of Hamas, the Palestinian terrorist group that launched the ongoing war in Gaza with its massacre across southern Israel last Oct. 7.
A flood of prominent Republican lawmakers repudiated the decision by the ICC and have vowed to sanction the organization.
“The Court is a dangerous joke. It is now time for the US Senate to act and sanction this irresponsible body. The Court defied every concept of fundamental fairness and legitimized a corrupt prosecutor’s actions,” Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) wrote on social media.
Graham also called on Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY), the current Senate majority leader, to advance bipartisan legislation that would sanction the ICC over its targeting of Israeli officials.
Sen. John Thune (R-SD), the Senate Republican Leader-elect, lambasted the ICC’s arrest warrants as “outrageous.” He vowed to place legislation on the floor to sanction the international court next year if the current Senate does not take action.
“The ICC’s arrest warrant against Prime Minister Netanyahu and former Defense Minister Gallant is outrageous, unlawful, and dangerous. Leader Schumer should bring a bill to the floor sanctioning the ICC. If he chooses not to act, the new Senate Republican majority next year will,” Thune wrote on X/Twitter.
Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME) wrote a statement in agreement with Thune, calling on the ICC to “abandon its unlawful pursuit of arrest warrants against Israeli officials.” Collins added that if the court refuses to drop the sanctions, “the Senate should immediately consider the bipartisan legislation passed by the House to sanction the ICC.”
Sen. Joni Ernst (R-IA) demanded the ICC reverse course on the warrants or risk being sanctioned by the United States.
“The ICC has lost all credibility. Instead of being an anti-Israel propaganda machine, it must reverse its unlawful arrest warrants against Israeli officials, or face sanctions,” Ernst wrote.
Sen. Shelley Moore Capito (R-WV) wrote that “it’s past time to sanction the ICC.”
Sen. Ted Budd (R-NC) lambasted the court as “illegitimate” and called on Congress to punish the international organization.
“Congress should immediately pass the Illegitimate Court Counteraction Act so that President Trump can sanction ICC officials on day one,” Budd posted on X/Twitter.
Some Democratic lawmakers also bashed the ICC, calling on the Biden administration to take swift action against the international court.
“I’m outraged by the ICC’s politically motivated efforts to target Israel and equate it to the Hamas terrorists who intentionally murdered, raped, and kidnapped civilians on October 7. I’m once again calling on [President Joe Biden] to use his authority to swiftly respond to this overreach,” Sen. Jacky Rosen (D-NV) wrote.
Sen. John Fetterman (D-PA), a lawmaker who has positioned himself as a stalwart ally of Israel in the year following the Oct. 7 slaughters, dismissed the ICC’s warrants as having “no standing, relevance, or path.”
Rep. Ritchie Torres (D-NY), arguably the most vocal Democratic supporter of Israel in the House of Representatives, wrote that the ICC decision “represents the weaponization of international law at its most egregious.” He added that the ICC “has set a precedent for criminalizing self-defense.”
“The ICC ignores the cause and context of the war. Israel did not initiate the war,” Torres wrote in a statement.
“None of that context seems to matter to the kangaroo court of the ICC, which cannot let facts get in the way of its ideological crusade against the Jewish State. The ICC should be sanctioned not for enforcing the law but for distorting it beyond recognition,” he added.
In May, the House passed the Illegitimate Court Counteraction Act, which would place sanctions on the ICC for “any effort to investigate, arrest, detain, or prosecute any protected person of the United States and its allies.” In October, House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) urged Schumer to bring the bill to the Senate floor for a vote.
The post US ‘Rejects’ ICC Arrest Warrants for Israeli Officials, Lawmakers Vow to Retaliate With Sanctions first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Hamas Celebrates ICC Arrest Warrants for Israeli Leaders, European States Say They’ll Comply With Court Decision
European Union foreign policy chief Josep Borrell attends a press conference on the day of EU-Ukraine Association Council in Brussels, Belgium, March 20, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Yves Herman
Hamas, which launched the war in Gaza with its massacre across southern Israel last Oct. 7, welcomed the International Criminal Court’s decision to issue arrest warrants on Thursday for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant.
“We welcome the International Criminal Court’s issuance of arrest warrants for terrorists Netanyahu and Gallant on charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity,” the Palestinian terrorist group said in a statement. “We call on the International Criminal Court [ICC] to expand the scope of accountability to all criminal occupation leaders.”
Hamas, which rules Gaza, also called on countries around the world to cooperate with the ICC’s decision “to stop the crimes of genocide against civilians in Gaza.”
Senior Hamas official Basem Naim praised the ICC’s ruling in comments to Reuters.
“This is an important step on the path to justice and bringing justice to the victims but it remains a limited and spiritual step if it is not backed practically by all countries,” he said.
Izzat al-Risheq, a senior Hamas member based in Qatar, was quoted by Israel’s Ynet news outlet as saying that “regardless of the possibility of implementation, the truth that has been revealed is that international justice is with us, while it is against the Zionist entity. This increased awareness and the exposure of the true terrorist face of the occupying entity is in the interest of the Palestinian cause and its future and strengthens our future goal of liberation.”
Meanwhile, several leaders and countries in Europe expressed support for the ICC following its decision to issue arrest warrants for Netanyahu, Gallant, and Hamas terror leader Mohammed Deif for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity in the Gaza conflict.
The European Union’s outgoing foreign policy chief, Josep Borrell, said the ICC’s decision was not political and should be respected and implemented.
“This decision is a binding decision on all states, all the state parties of the court, which include all members of the European Union,” he said. “The tragedy in Gaza has to stop.”
Dutch Foreign Minister Caspar Veldkamp addressed the arrest warrants in parliament.
“The Netherlands obviously respects the independence of the ICC,” he said. “We will examine the ruling, but the position of the cabinet is clear: We are a party to the Rome Statute, and based on the Rome Statute [which established the court] and the ICC Implementing Act, we are obliged to cooperate with the ICC, and we will also do that.”
Veldkamp added that the Dutch government “won’t engage in non-essential contacts” with Netanyahu and concluded, “We will act on the arrest warrants. We fully comply with the Rome Statute of the ICC.”
Irish Prime Minister Simon Harris called the warrants “an extremely significant step” and added that anyone in a position to assist the ICC in carrying out its work must do so “with urgency.” The country’s Foreign Minister Micheál Martin emphasized that Dublin is a “strong supporter of the ICC,” urging countries to “respect its independence and impartiality, with no attempts made to undermine the court.”
Spain’s second Vice-President and Labor Minister Yolando Diaz praised the ICC’s decision.
“Always on the side of justice and international law,” Diaz said on X/Twitter. “The genocide of the Palestinian people cannot go unpunished.”
Belgium’s deputy prime minister, Petra De Sutter, called for fellow European countries to “impose economic sanctions, suspend the [EU] Association Agreement with Israel and uphold these arrest warrants,” referring to the deal that established the legal basis for the EU’s current extensive trade ties with Israel.
“War crimes and crimes against humanity cannot go unpunished,” De Sutter added on X.
The Swiss Federal Office of Justice said it would have to arrest Netanyahu or Gallant if they entered Switzerland and initiate extradition to the ICC, arguing it is obliged to cooperate with the court under the Rome Statute.
French Foreign Ministry spokesperson Christophe Lemoine said France’s reaction to the warrants would be “in line with ICC statutes” but did not clarify whether France would arrest the Israeli leaders if they came to the country, citing legal complexities.
Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani said his country would consider how to interpret the decision and act together with allies. “We support the ICC,” he said. “The court must play a legal role and not a political role.”
Norway’s Foreign Minister Espen Barth Eide said, “It is important that the ICC carries out its mandate in a judicious manner. I have confidence that the court will proceed with the case based on the highest fair trial standards.”
In Sweden, Foreign Minister Maria Malmer Stenergard said Swedish law enforcement determines the arrest of subjects of ICC warrants on its territory, adding that the country “supports the court’s important work and protect its independence and integrity.”
A spokesperson for British Prime Minister Keir Starmer did not confirm whether Britain would implement the warrants.
Austrian Foreign Minister Alexander Schallenberg criticized the warrants as “incomprehensible and ludicrous” but said Austria would implement them as a party to the Rome Statute.
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