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The Laughable Excuses Given by the BBC & CNN for Israel Capital City Mistake
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.
There’s chutzpah, and then there’s the BBC’s explanation for why it should be allowed to incorrectly describe Tel Aviv as Israel’s capital — an explanation so absurd and convoluted it borders on farce.
Now, the BBC isn’t alone in its arrogant insistence that it gets to decide the capital city of a country 2,500 miles away from its London headquarters.
We’ve long been amazed at the sheer ignorance of journalists who seemingly believe that misinforming their readers about Israeli geography and governance will magically solve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
But most media outlets we catch making this error will eventually correct the record. Take The Guardian, for example, which, after some back-and-forth with HonestReporting, agreed to make four amendments last month to stories that erroneously called Tel Aviv the capital.
Rarely will a news organization dig in its heels quite as much as the publicly-funded British Broadcasting Corporation, which is mounting a Herculean defense of what it has apparently deemed is its divine right to keep making the same mistake.
Indeed, the mental gymnastics the BBC performs to justify its repetitive error are so laughably ludicrous that we had no choice but to put them on display here in all their cringe-inducing glory.
A brief background.
On April 20, HonestReporting complained to the broadcaster over a segment aired the day before on BBC Radio4’s The Now Show, featuring Steven Punt and Hugh Dennis, who ended the show by referring to Tel Aviv as Israel’s capital.
On the last ever episode of @BBCRadio4 The Now Show, Steve Punt and Hugh Dennis end by inaccurately referring to Tel Aviv as the capital of Israel. It was Jerusalem when your show first aired in 1998, and it’s Jerusalem still. pic.twitter.com/SzuJvNILaH
— HonestReporting (@HonestReporting) April 19, 2024
Five days later on April 25, the BBC’s complaints team responded simply to say that while it does “report that Israel claims Jerusalem as its capital, this isn’t widely recognized by the international community, with most foreign embassies being in Tel Aviv.”
We appealed, pointing out first, that the BBC had not reported in that segment that Israel claims its capital is Jerusalem, and second, that the international community’s recognition, or indeed lack thereof, does not change material reality.
For over a month, we heard nothing.
And then, on the last day of May, we finally understood why it took the BBC so long to respond. The email we received was nothing short of a masterclass in crafting complete nonsense.
After first assuring us that our “concerns” had been raised with senior managers at Radio 4, we were told the following:
In this comedy programme, the presenter made a passing reference to Iran’s launching of drones against Israel. Diplomatically, it is clear that Iran considers it was retaliating against Tel Aviv, as evidenced by the Iranian government billboard unveiled around the same time with the slogan “Tel Aviv is our battleground, not Tehran.”
It continued:
In this context, as a passing reference in a comedy programme where the audience would not expect an explanation of the differing views on the status of Jerusalem, we consider that the line ‘Tehran retaliated directly against Tel Aviv…’ was a reflection of the news events of the week with Iran’s position on its dispute, rather than a suggestion that the BBC considers Tel Aviv to be the capital city.
Let’s break this down for those who aren’t quite as seasoned as we are at unraveling the BBC’s peculiar spin.
The broadcaster is arguing that listeners of its Radio 4 comedy show should have known — from a story published on its website — that billboards in Iran contained threats to launch missiles at Tel Aviv.
Aware of this, listeners should have, according to the BBC, known that “diplomatically, it is clear that Iran considers it was retaliating against Tel Aviv.”
Of course, there is a good reason that Iran “considers” it was retaliating against Tel Aviv: the Islamist regime doesn’t even recognize the State of Israel, let alone its capital, preferring to call it the “Zionist entity.”
It’s nice to know that the BBC takes its editorial guidance from the mullahs in Iran.
And now CNN.
Like the BBC, CNN also tried to defend a capital city error in one of its pieces, albeit with less imagination.
This month, we noted that an opinion piece by Peter Bergen had used Tel Aviv as a synonym when describing the announcement of a peace proposal made in Washington by US President Joe Biden.
The same way the peace plan was unveiled in the US capital Washington DC, so if it were to have been unveiled in Israel, it would have come from Jerusalem, the Israeli seat of government and its capital, not in Tel Aviv. 2⃣ pic.twitter.com/RqYnNooQDx
— HonestReporting (@HonestReporting) June 2, 2024
This time, CNN argued that the Israeli government is “active in both Tel Aviv and Jerusalem,” which it said was evidenced by the fact that Benjamin Netanyahu had recently held press conferences in Tel Aviv.
We were then told an update to the piece saying that the proposal “wasn’t announced in Jerusalem or Tel Aviv is appropriate.”
By this reasoning, if Joe Biden were to hold a press conference in say, Chicago, for example, one could argue it should be given capital city status.
While the reasoning given by both outlets was so silly it was almost comedic, the two incidents have further exposed a widespread shift during this latest Israel-Hamas war in which journalists have abandoned impartiality, morphing into journalists-cum-activists.
Lastly, even if we were to accept that Jerusalem was not identified in stories as Israel’s capital, there is still no good reason why Tel Aviv should be mentioned in such stories, ever.
Tel Aviv is not, nor has it ever been, Israel’s capital.
We intend to continue trudging through the BBC’s convoluted complaints process and will escalate further if necessary. Watch this space.
The author is a contributor to HonestReporting, a Jerusalem-based media watchdog with a focus on antisemitism and anti-Israel bias — where a version of this article first appeared.
The post The Laughable Excuses Given by the BBC & CNN for Israel Capital City Mistake first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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A pro-Israel rally at the University of Toronto was headlined by Columbia University professor Shai Davidai
Around 200 people gathered for a pro-Israel demonstration at University of Toronto’s downtown campus at King’s College Circle—which was the site of one of Canada’s largest pro-Palestinian encampments during May […]
The post A pro-Israel rally at the University of Toronto was headlined by Columbia University professor Shai Davidai appeared first on The Canadian Jewish News.
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‘Not Welcome’: New Pro-Hamas Campaign Aims to Abolish Hillel Campus Chapters
A statue of George Washington tied with a Palestinian flag and a keffiyeh inside a pro-Hamas encampment is pictured at George Washington University in Washington, DC, US, May 2, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Craig Hudson
The campus group National Students for Justice in Palestine (NSJP) is waging a campaign to gut Jewish life in academia, calling for the abolition of Hillel International campus chapters, the largest collegiate organization for Jewish students in the world.
“Over the past several decades, Hillel has monopolized for Jewish campus life into a pipeline for pro-Israel indoctrination, genocide-apologia, and material support to the Zionist project and its crimes,” a social media account operating the campaign, titled #DropHillel, said in a manifesto published last week. “Across the country, Hillel chapters have invited Israeli soldiers to their campuses; promoted propaganda trips such as birthright; and organized charity drives for the Israeli military.”
It continued, “Such actions reveal Hillel’s ideological and material investment in Zionism, despite the organization’s facade as being simply a ‘Jewish cultural space.’”
DropHillel claims to be “Jewish-led,” although only a small minority of Jews oppose Zionism, and the group has been linked to and promoted by Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) chapters.
Hillel International has provided Jewish students a home away from home during the academic year. However, NSJP says it wants to “weaken” it and “dismantle oppression.”
The idea has already been picked up by pro-Hamas student groups at one college, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, according to The Daily Tar Heel, the school’s official student newspaper. On Oct. 9, it reported, a member of Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) unveiled the idea for “no more Hillel” during a rally which, among other things, demanded removing Israel from UNC’s study abroad program and adopting the boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) movement. Addressing the comments to the paper days later, SJP, which has been linked to Islamist terrorist organizations, proclaimed that shuttering Hillel is a coveted goal of the anti-Zionist movement.
“Zionism is a racist supremacist ideology advocating for the creation and sustenance of an ethnostate through the expulsion and annihilation of native people,” the group told the paper. “Therefore, any group that advocates for a supremacist ideology — be it the KKK, the Proud Boys, Hillel, or Heels for Israel — should not be welcome on campus.”
The #DropHillel campaign came amid an unprecedented surge in anti-Israel incidents on college campuses, which, according to a report published last month by the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), have reached crisis levels.
Revealing a “staggering” 477 percent increase in anti-Zionist activity involving assault, vandalism, and other phenomena, the report — titled “Anti-Israel Activism on US Campuses, 2023-2024” — painted a bleak picture of America’s higher education system poisoned by political extremism and hate.
“As the year progressed, Jewish students and Jewish groups on campus came under unrelenting scrutiny for any association, actual or perceived, with Israel or Zionism,” the report said. “This often led to the harassment of Jewish members of campus communities and vandalism of Jewish institutions. In some cases, it led to assault. These developments were underpinned by a steady stream of rhetoric from anti-Israel activists expressing explicit support for US-designated terrorists organizations, such as Hamas, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) and others.”
The report added that 10 campuses accounted for 16 percent of all incidents tracked by ADL researchers, with Columbia University and the University of Michigan combining for 90 anti-Israel incidents — 52 and 38, respectively. Harvard University, the University of California – Los Angeles, Rutgers University New Brunswick, Stanford University, Cornell University, and others filled out the rest of the top 10. Violence, it continued, was most common at universities in the state of California, where anti-Zionist activists punched a Jewish student for filming him at a protest.
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.
The post ‘Not Welcome’: New Pro-Hamas Campaign Aims to Abolish Hillel Campus Chapters first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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‘Muslim for Trump’ Launches Initiatives in Key Battleground States, Says Candidate Will Bring ‘Peace’ to Gaza
Former US President Donald Trump is seen at a campaign event in South Carolina. Photo: Reuters/Sam Wolfe
The “Muslims for Trump” organization has officially launched initiatives to help elect Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump to the White House, arguing that he would be more likely to end the war in Gaza than Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris.
In a statement released on Monday, the group said it will focus on recruiting Muslim voters in key battleground states such as Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Georgia, and North Carolina. The organization both praised Trump for his supposed “peace-focused” approach to ending the war in Gaza and condemned Harris for helping facilitate a so-called “genocide.”
“After meeting with President Trump, it was clear to me he is the right leader for Muslims to get behind,” Rabiul Chowdhury, co-founder of Muslims for Trump and former co-chair of the “Abandon Harris Movement,” said in a statement.
Chowdhury added that during his discussions with Trump, the former president vowed to “ending the escalation of wars and bringing peace to war-torn regions.” In contrast to Trump’s promise to stop the “bloodshed” in Gaza, he claimed, Harris has “recklessly pushed us toward World War III.”
Chowdhury, a self-described “peace advocate,” urged the Muslim community not to fall victim to supposed “misinformation” campaigns by the media and Democrats that paint the former president as hostile to immigrants. He claimed that the former president’s focus is on “ending war, not dividing families through false immigration claims.”
Samra Luqman, chair of the Michigan chapter of Muslims for Trump, underscored the need to punish the Biden administration for what he described as supporting a “genocide” in Gaza.
“The goal of this election is to hold the Biden administration accountable for a genocide. No amount of fear mongering or scare tactics will persuade my community into forgiving the mutilation, live-burning, and genocide of over 200,000 people,” he said.
According to data produced by the Hamas-controlled Gaza Health Ministry, roughly 40,000 people have died in Gaza since the war began last October. Israel has said that its forces have killed about 20,000 Hamas terrorists during its military campaign.
Israel says it has gone to unprecedented lengths to try and avoid civilian casualties, noting its efforts to evacuate areas before it targets them and to warn residents of impending military operations with leaflets, text messages, and other forms of communication.
On the organization Muslims for Trump’s official website, it claims that the Abraham Accords, a series of historic, Trump administration-brokered normalization agreements between Israel and several countries in the Arab world, helped stabilize the Middle East. It also says that had Trump not lost the 2020 presidential race, the so-called “genocide” could have been prevented.
“Under Trump’s leadership, the Abraham Accords were brokered, fostering peaceful relations between Israel and several Arab countries. Supporters might argue that Trump’s diplomacy prioritized peace and stability in the Middle East, reducing the likelihood of large-scale conflicts like genocide,” the group wrote.
Over the course of his campaign, Trump has repeatedly touted his support for the Jewish state during his singular term in office. Trump has boasted about his administration’s work in fostering the Abraham Accords, promising to resume efforts to strengthen them if he were to win November’s US presidential election.
Harsh US sanctions levied on Iran under Trump crippled the Iranian economy and led its foreign exchange reserves to plummet. Trump and his Republican supporters in the US Congress have criticized the Biden administration for renewing billions of dollars in US sanctions waivers, which had the effect of unlocking frozen funds and allowing the country to access previously inaccessible hard currency.
Trump also recognized Israel’s sovereignty over the Golan Heights, a strategic region on Israel’s northern border previously controlled by Syria, and also moved the US embassy in Israel to Jerusalem, recognizing the city as the Jewish state’s capital.
Despite Harris’s repeated efforts to woo Muslim voters, polling data indicates that the demographic has made a dramatic swing away from the Democratic Party. Polling data from the Arab American Institute reveals that Trump slightly edges Harris among Muslim voters by a margin of 42 to 41 percent. A report from the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) shows that Green Party candidate Jill Stein leads Harris and Trump with Muslim voters in the key swing states of Michigan, Wisconsin, and Arizona.
The post ‘Muslim for Trump’ Launches Initiatives in Key Battleground States, Says Candidate Will Bring ‘Peace’ to Gaza first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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