Tag Archives: The Observer

May 12 2013

Pictorial representations of Israel promoted by the Guardian

Over at the BBC Watch site we have a link to an interesting 2005 report by Trevor Asserson and Michael Paluch on the subject of the BBC’s use of images to depict the Palestinian – Israeli conflict and the way in which editorial decisions regarding which pictures to use can influence audience perception of the conflict. 

“We detected frequently used techniques for evoking sympathy or antipathy. Israelis were almost always depicted as armed, male and as soldiers. They were often disembodied, showing arms, legs, boots or weapons, but not faces. Palestinians by contrast were very frequently depicted as women and children. Palestinian men, when shown, were generally unarmed (even Policemen) and were often praying, kneeling or bowing.”

Of course the BBC is by no means the only media organization to use selectively chosen images in order to communicate subliminal messages regarding Israel and Israeli society. On the Guardian’s “Israel” page on May 11th we find a link to a feature from its sister paper The Observer entitled “The Observer’s 20 photographs of the week” and sub-headed “The best news and culture images from around the world over the past seven days”. 

Guardian Israel page 12 5

Among the twenty photographs from around the world, two come from Israel and both have a military theme. 

Observer 1

Observer 2

The caption to the first photograph reads:

“From a series of excellent images by Menahem Kahana, an Israeli soldier prays inside a net tent pitched close to Merkava tanks deployed in the Israeli annexed Golan Heights near the border with Syria. UN chief Ban Ki-moon has appealed for restraint after Israeli air strikes on targets near Damascus.”

It is possible to count seven more soldiers in that picture – none of whom are praying – but interestingly the reader’s attention is steered towards the one soldier who is. The suggestion of linkage between the IDF and religion is a popular theme with both photographers and editors – as shown, for example, by the BBC’s use of images to illustrate last November’s conflict between Hamas and Israel. 

The inclusion of the last sentence in the picture’s caption mistakenly suggests direct linkage between the alleged Israeli air strikes on consignments of Iranian weapons bound for the terrorist organization Hizballah and the presence of the tanks depicted in the photographs in the Golan Heights. In fact, tank crews have been training in the Golan Heights for decades, so the pictures can hardly be said to represent “news”. 

Another noticeable phenomenon in pictorial portrayals of Israel is the tendency of photographers and photo editors to over-represent the Orthodox stream of Israeli society, which even the highest estimates put at a mere 10% of the whole population. The Observer is apparently no exception: the previous edition of this photo feature also included two photographs from Israel (out of a total of 20) and both of those images concentrated on members of the Orthodox community during the festival of Lag B’Omer. However, elsewhere in Israel at the time, considerably more Israelis were celebrating the same festival by having bonfires, baking potatoes in the embers and toasting marshmallows. Images depicting those activities would of course have been more likely to prompt a sense of identification in most Observer readers. 

Observer 3

Observer 4

Images of Israel with a non-military and/or non-religious theme are to be found all too rarely among the growing number of pictorial features produced by media organisations. That fact is undoubtedly influencing public perception of Israel in general and the Arab-Israeli conflict in particular, and it is a factor to which photo editors need to address. 

Feb 17 2013

Peter Beaumont’s “unnamed source” affirms Guardian narrative about ‘Prisoner X’

Observer foreign affairs editor Peter Beaumont just published his seventh report over the course of three days on Prisoner X – a man believed to have been an Australian-Israeli Mossad agent jailed by Israel because he was about to reveal state secrets to Australian authorities or the media, who committed suicide in his cell in 2010.

His latest piece, co-authored with Phoebe Greenwood, on Feb. 16 is titled ‘Israeli government to compensate family of Prisoner X‘, and is based on “an unnamed source” quoted in Haaretz, claiming a compensation deal was agreed to following the conclusion of an inquiry into the death of the prisoner (aka, Ben Zygier).

Beaumont’s latest post attempts to buttress the narrative, advanced in his other reports on Prisoner X, that Israel behaved in a manner inconsistent with democratic norms.  As we noted previously, one of Beaumont’s reports from Feb. 14 includes the following passage, citing the analysis of unnamed commentators:

“The latest revelations come amid a growing outcry over the case in Israel, with some comparing the treatment of Zygier to that meted out in the Soviet Union or Argentina and Chile under their military dictatorships.”

In his latest report, he cites an “unnamed source“, thus:

“According to one unnamed source familiar with the Zygier case who spoke the YNet website: “When an Israeli is detained for security offences, a process begins, but no one knows how it will end. He disappears into interrogation rooms, and no one knows where he is. They do it using two tools: A gag order and an injunction that prevents the detainee from meeting with an attorney.”

However, contrary to the claims made by the source cited by Beaumont, not only did the detainee in this case meet with his attorney (Avigdor Feldman), but did so, according to an official at the State Prosecutor’s Office quoted in the same Feb 15. Ynet story Beaumont cited, “within days” of being incarcerated.

The official at the State Prosecutor’s Office added the following: 

 ”…the picture painted by the media is far from reality. There are no ‘prisoners x’ in the State of Israel…It’s an expression taken from dictatorships where people were made to disappear without having seen a lawyer or family. There was no such thing here.”

In the past 25 years there were very few cases in which it was decided for security reasons to hold prisoners under pseudonyms.

In those cases, as in this particular case, the families were immediately made aware of the arrest and within a number of days the prisoner was given access to legal counsel. As in regular cases, there was due criminal process with the prisoner able to petition the court like any other inmate.”

Consistent with this Israeli official’s argument, a definitive study in ‘Homeland Security Affairs’ determined that, regarding issues “such as how long an individual can be detained without access to counsel for purposes of interrogation”, Israel “provides more overall due process and substantive rights to [security] detainees than America’s years of incommunicado and indefinite executive detention”.

To serious journalists, providing readers with relevant context and a comparative political or legal analysis of the issue matters.

Beaumont’s story, on the other hand, like so many other reports about Israel written by his fellow Guardian Group ‘journavists‘, cited only those “sources”  who confirmed his desired political narrative.

Related articles
Oct 21 2012

Guardian publication contributor evokes Warsaw Ghetto in describing Israel’s security fence

On Oct. 21 the Observer (sister publication of the Guardian) published a review, by film critic Philip French, of the film ’5 Broken Cameras‘, a documentary produced by a Palestinian about his “resistance” to Israel’s security fence in Bil’in.

French writes the following:

“Emad Burnat, the peasant and smallholder who spends his days and nights recording life about him in his native Bil’in, the township where his family has lived for generations

Like Filip in Camera Buff, Emad bought his first camera when his fourth son, Gibreel, was born in 2005. He initially used it for home movies and then, at their invitation, to make similar pictures for his neighbours.

But fairly soon Emad developed a sense of empowerment and a duty to serve his community. His camera became a way of uniting his fellow [Bil'in] citizens, publicising their struggle and becoming a witness for posterity when the Israeli authorities sent in troops to deprive them of land to create a defensive barrier of steel and wire that later became a high concrete wall.”

Background not provided by French includes the fact that, before the fence was erected, terrorists moved freely from Palestinian cities such as Bil’in to Israeli ones killing hundreds of innocent Jewish civilians. 

French also fails to note the 2011 relocation of the fence bordering Bil’in due to a ruling by Israel’s Supreme Court, which enlarged Palestinian territory, making the village more suitable for Palestinian agricultural.

Map outlining the new security fence route bordering the Palestinian village of Bil’in

However, in addition to the story’s predictable Palestinian narrative, the most absurd claim is made by French in the following passage:

“Emad developed a sense of empowerment and a duty to serve his community. His camera became a way of uniting his fellow citizens, publicising their struggle and becoming a witness for posterity when the Israeli authorities sent in troops to deprive them of land to create a defensive barrier of steel and wire that later became a high concrete wall. Inevitably, seeing this barrier going up in Israel we think of the wall surrounding the Warsaw ghetto, the one that appeared overnight in Berlin…”

Of course, any sane commentator would dismiss out of hand the notion that Israel’s security wall evokes (in any conceivable manner) the Jewish ghetto walls erected by the Nazis.

The Warsaw Ghetto, the largest Jewish ghetto in Nazi-occupied Europe, was established in the Polish capital in 1940. Eventually, over 400,000 Jews resided in an area of 3.4 km. From there, at least 254,000 ghetto residents were sent to the Treblinka death camp over a period of two months in 1942.

Average food rations in 1941 for Jews in Warsaw were limited to a mere 184 calories, and, among the Jews who weren’t sent to Nazi death camps, over 100,000 of the ghetto’s residents died due to disease, starvation or random killings.

Starving Jewish boy in the Warsaw ghetto, 1942.

Bil’in is a Palestinian administered town, and is not a ghetto in even the broadest sense of the word. 

The Warsaw ghetto walls were designed to keep Jews from escaping. 

Israel’s security fence was designed to keep terrorists from infiltrating Israel and murdering Jews.  

Israel’s security fence would only evoke a Holocaust-related comparison for those inebriated by the constant drumbeat of Guardian anti-Zionist propaganda.

Related articles
Oct 14 2012

Crude, childish and offensive: Peter Beaumont criticizes Islamophobia of “paranoid” Israelis

The Emmy-Award winning U.S. television drama ‘Homeland’, based on the Israeli series Hatufim (Abductees חטופים), is the subject of Observer foreign affairs editor Peter Beaumont’s latest column. (The Observer is the sister publication of the Guardian.)

While the Israeli series depicts the lives of Israeli soldiers who were captured seventeen years ago while on a mission in Lebanon, and their return home, the American series stars Claire Danes as a CIA officer who believes that a U.S. Marine held captive by Al-Qaeda as a POW was turned by the enemy and now threatens the U.S.

The show has received much acclaim by critics (including by several contributors at the Guardian), and has even received praise from President Obama.

Beaumont’s piece, ‘Homeland is brilliant drama but does it present a crude image of Muslims?‘, Oct. 13, contains this strap line:

The slick US drama, now into its second series on Channel 4, draws praise from critics and viewers, but its ridiculous view of Arabs and Islam is a distortion of Middle Eastern realities

Beaumont writes:

[The] fictional drama tells us truths about ourselves in ways that can be as uncomfortable as they are unintended. The Emmy-winning Homeland on Channel 4 is a case in point. Its plotting is as ridiculous as it is exciting. But what makes it difficult to watch is its treatment of Muslims.

In the first episode of the new season we were confronted with a new character, a glamorous correspondent with a cutglass English accent, a Palestinian family and access to both the CIA and the US Congress. Like the Saudi prince from the last series and the academic, behind the scenes these high-profile Muslims living in the US share a secret: both willingly or otherwise they are covert helpers of Abu Nasir, the al-Qaida terrorist leader.

In other words, it does not matter whether they are rich, smart, discreetly enjoying a western lifestyle or attractive: all are to be suspected.

I admit I have no idea how the story arcs in Homeland will develop and what surprises are in store. What I do know is how both Arabs and Islamists have been portrayed thus far as violent fanatics, some of whom are powerful and influential infiltrators.

As someone who has spent much time in the Middle East, I find the depictions not only crude and childish but offensive.”

Beaumont later adds:

“Should any of this matter in a fictional series? The answer is yes.

…

The reality is that what Homeland portrays is a peculiar view of the Islamic world, one rooted, perhaps, in its genesis as an Israeli drama, where the view of the surrounding neighbourhood is more paranoid and defensive. It matters for this reason. Popular culture both informs and echoes our prejudices.” [emphasis added]

Beaumont’s moral inversion is extraordinary.

He’s not only criticizing the U.S. show for engaging in anti-Muslim racism, but arguing that such a pattern of ‘Islamophobia’ may be rooted, at least in part, in Israeli “paranoia” about their Arab and Muslim neighbors.

While we’ve often argued that the most egregious antisemitic habit at the Guardian Group involves their continuing sins of omission - ignoring endemic Judeophobia in the Muslim and Arab world – Beaumont, in imputing irrationality to Israeli concerns about Arab and Muslim terrorism and antisemtism, seems to suggest that Jews are in fact the racists in the region.

To such Guardian Left commentators it is evidently paranoid of Jews to express concern over polls demonstrating that roughly 95% of the citizens in Arab countries neighboring Israel admit to disliking Jews, and not merely Israelis, and that, within such cultures, the demonization of Jews (and Judaism) represents not aberrant but normative behavior.

Additionally, it is apparently a sign of Islamophobia for Israeli Jews to fear a Palestinian political culture which incites terrorism against Jewish civilians and promotes extreme antisemitism.

Similarly, those who take it seriously when one of the most popular Islamist spiritual leaders in the world literally calls for Allah to kill every last Jew on earth are, no doubt, engaging in fear-mongering or cynical Zionist ‘hasbara’.

For such faux-liberals, Israelis who merely ask that the world remember the nearly 900,000 Jews ethnically cleansed from Arab countries – lands where their ancestors had lived for centuries – stand outside of their sympathetic imagination.

Finally, those who would characterize Israelis as paranoid somehow fail to recognize that non-Jewish Middle Eastern culture is dangerously susceptible to the most crude anti-Zionist (and antisemitic) conspiracy theories. 

What else other than paranoia would lead such a large number of Muslims to engage in Holocaust denial, believe that Jews were behind 9/11 or are even plotting to take over the world?

More broadly, the tendency of some on the left to ignore even the most conclusive statistics and reports – and the most chilling videos – attesting to the fact that the central address for Jew hatred in the world has clearly shifted from Europe to the Middle East represents more than merely a dangerous moral blind spot.  

Those who attempt to “contextualize”, or even excuse, such hatred towards Jews – sometimes masked by anti-Zionism and sometimes not – are making a broader point.  They seem to be suggesting that (unlike other times in history) this time those aligned against the Jews may be justified in their enmity; this time Judeophobic conspiracy theories could in fact be based on an understandable frustration; that, this time, it is the behavior of Jews, and not the Jews haters, that drives, antisemitism.  

“Is it possible to understand the rise of antisemitism?”, they seem to be asking.

This blog consistently attempts to provide a clear and unambiguous answer to various forms of such a maddening query: No, it is not.

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May 14 2012

Contrary to what The Observer claims, there has not been “relative peace” in Israel

Weapons found in Palestinian terror suspect’s home, near Hebron, January 2012

Yesterday we commented on an Observer editorial which harshly condemned Israel for the use of administrative detention to detain suspected terrorists: “Observer op-ed on ‘hunger strikers’ exposes double standards on administrative detention coverage“.

In addition to the failure of The Observer (sister publication of The Guardian) to provide context on the use of such practices by other democracies and its failing to acknowledge that many of those held have already engaged in terror activities, the editorial made this astonishingly inaccurate claim:

“Indeed, according to the UN’s special rapporteur on Palestinian human rights, over the past year the number of administrative detentions has almost doubled despite the period of relative peace in Israel.” [emphasis mine]

First, it evidently never occurs to Guardian Group journalists that the degree to which there has been a decrease in the number of major terror attacks may have something to do with preventative anti-terror procedures, including administrative detention.  

But moreover, while the kind of large-scale deadly suicide attacks Israel experienced during the 2nd Intifada have thankfully decreased dramatically, Palestinian terrorists’ attempts to launch such attacks have not waned.

As I noted in the previous post, there are dozens of terror attacks in Israeli each month (see official Israeli terror statistics here), most of which the Guardian (and the majority of the mainstream media) fails to report.

In addition to rockets fired into Israeli towns from Gaza ( 627 deadly projectiles were fired in 2011 and 272 so far in 2012), here are a few recent attempted attacks, thankfully thwarted by the IDF, which belie the claim that there has been “relative peace” in Israel.

  • February 21: A powerful explosive device was uncovered along the Israel-Egypt border. Israeli forces saw a man hurling a suspicious bag and immediately fleeing the scene. The explosive was detonated in a controlled manner. No one was hurt.

There is one thing, of course, that all of these thwarted Palestinian terror attacks (against innocent Israeli civilians) have in common:

They weren’t reported by the Guardian. 

Related articles
Apr 30 2012

The Guardian, the Boycotters’ press release, the Co-op and the Hamas link.

Why it should have taken two writers – both Observer ‘chief reporter’ Tracy McVeigh and Guardian Jerusalem correspondent Harriet Sherwood – to put together what is in fact no more than a re-hash of a ‘Boycott Israel Network’ press release is anyone’s guess. But it apparently did, and the result is this so-called article from April 29th on the subject of the Co-operative Group’s decision to boycott not only Israeli firms located over the green line, but also those with any connections to other businesses in those areas. 

The section from the BIN press release which McVeigh and Sherwood neglected to include provides background information on how this decision on the part of the Co-op came about. 

“The announcement by the Co-op came just before their Regional AGMs, due to take place over the next two weeks, and where motions on this issue have been submitted for discussion.  For months Co-op members have been highlighting their concerns about trade with complicit companies through co-ordinated letter-writing and discussions with local offices.”

For those unfamiliar with the Co-op’s structure and the manner in which that lends itself to easy manipulation by pressure groups, here is a brief primer. Anyone over the age of 16 can become a member of the Co-op for £1. Most of those who join do so for the offers, discounts and end of year dividends, but it is also possible for them to set up local members’ groups and the Co-op actually assigns funding to enable their meetings. 

The nature and purpose of each local group depends very much upon the members. Some might choose to go in for tasting the supermarket’s new range of wines at their meetings. Others may decide to recruit more new members at a local gala or engage in some kind of charity work. Still others may decide to liaise between the Co-op and the local community on a transition town-style green agenda – for example persuading their local Co-op to abandon the use of plastic bags or recycle food waste as compost. 

The local groups send representatives to regional meetings, which in turn send representation to national level meetings. Thus, anyone committed enough to put in the time and effort can promote a specific agenda and influence the Co-op’s operations at both local and national level. 

And that is precisely how this latest (and the previous, less far-reaching) boycott decision came about. Around 2008 the Co-op was identified by anti-Israel campaigners – in particular members of the PSC – as a ‘soft’ target. They became members, set up local groups and began pushing their agenda up the ladder. That task was not particularly difficult; the vast majority of Co-op members do not attend meetings and even those who do are often quite relieved to find that someone else is willing to spend time going to regional AGMs. 

The project was made even easier by the fact that, unable to compete with Britain’s big supermarket chains on price or quality, the Co-op markets itself as the progressive ‘ethical’ alternative. 

Sherwood and McVeigh quote one Hilary Smith in their article, describing her as “Co-op member and Boycott Israel Network (BIN) agricultural trade campaign co-ordinator”. The Boycott Israel Network of course involves itself in far more than just supermarket boycotts. 

Smith is also a member of Sheffield PSC and Sheffield BDS and active in the ‘Coordin8‘ lobbying network (her regional organizer is recent failed ‘flytilla’ participant and would-be fixer of online polls Terry Gallogly of York PSC). In 2009 she was to be found addressing students occupying Sheffield University on behalf of Sheffield PSC and is apparently not averse to the libeling of Israel as an ‘apartheid’ state. 

In February of this year Smith took part in an ‘Israel Apartheid Week’ event at Sheffield University which also featured a speaker from ‘Who Profits‘, (a ‘Coalition of Women for Peace‘ offshoot) who was described in the promotional material as coming “from Haifa in the occupied territories”. That negation of Israel’s existence is of course an underlying principle of the BDS movement. 

In addition to her above activities, Hilary Smith is also a ‘volunteer international coordinator’ for the ‘Free Gaza’ movement ‘. Here she is reporting on a ‘Free Gaza’ speaking tour of the UK. Here she is acting as official contact and spokesperson for UK Free Gaza in 2009. Here she is posting information about the 2010 flotilla on the UK Trade Union movement’s ‘Labournet‘ site and here complaining to the BBC about its coverage of the Mavi Marmara incident and its portrayal of the ‘Free Gaza’ movement. Ahead of the 2008 flotilla organized by ‘Free Gaza’, Smith chaired a press conference held in London.

The participants in one of the 2008 jaunts organized by ‘Free Gaza’ did reach their destination and were received (and presented with medals) by leaders of Hamas, – the terrorist organization designated by the UK government which ‘Free Gaza’ enables and supports. 

Activists in the ‘Free Gaza’ movement are very aware of the legal implications of their actions, as this briefing document – seized aboard a ‘Free Gaza’ ship – indicates.

Legal briefing given by Free Gaza to passengers on the ship Challenger

For the source of the above document and more information on the ‘Free Gaza’ movement, its ties to Hamas and other designated terror-connected organizations such as the IHH and its roots in the International Solidarity Movement (ISM), see here. 

The management of the Co-operative Group may not be aware that it has in fact been manipulated into this latest boycott move by subscribers to a political campaign which works towards the rather less than ethical ultimate aim of wiping a sovereign country off the map and often collaborates with designated terror organisations in order to do so.  

On the other hand, the Co-op might simply not care. After all, this is the same organization which (rather hilariously, given its advertising spiel on ‘ethical banking‘) provides banking services  to George Galloway’s ‘Viva Palestina‘ – which is at this very moment  on yet another Hamas-supporting road-trip and travelling via Syria, where the incumbent dictator (for whom Galloway has such admiration)  is still slaughtering civilians in their thousands. 

This new boycott move by the Co-operative Group should actually be seen as very useful on a number of fronts.

It exposes the way in which it is laughably easy for very small numbers of energetic activists to dictate the agendas of large organizations in the UK. We have seen it happen in British churches, universities and trade unions – now it is the turn of the co-operative movement.

It also points a spotlight on the discrepancies between the ‘ethical’ image the Co-op likes to project for PR purposes and its actual practice. Let’s face it; the £350,000 worth of trade affected by this boycott is negligible (barely the price of a modest Tel Aviv apartment), but the move does highlight once again how the Co-op is apparently willing to overlook the terror-sympathetic  connections (and real aims) of clients and campaigning members in order to curry favor with a perceived  ’progressive’ client base. 

The move also serves to highlight the manner in which UK-based anti-Israel campaigners have in the last decade or so managed to bring their message into the mainstream at local levels. Using letters to local newspapers, occasional PSC or ‘Friends of Palestine’ stalls and demonstrations, co-opting the support of churches and various specific interest groups, they have ensured that although the vast majority of the population understands little or nothing about the Arab-Israeli conflict, many are nonetheless convinced that they are capable of making ethical judgments about it. 

Of course most British citizens will find this move by the Co-op somewhat less than ethical, if not downright abhorrent. The good news is that due to the company’s structure, they can do something about it by using exactly the same methods as employed by BDS activists in order to reverse the agenda. 

Related articles
Apr 27 2012

More from the Guardian ‘Style Guide’.

As many of us were surprised to learn earlier this week, not only does the ‘Guardian and Observer Style Guide’ arbitrarily declare that Jerusalem is not the capital of Israel, but it also relocates the capital to Tel Aviv. 

Jerusalem is not the capital of Israel; Tel Aviv is (a mistake we have made more than once)

One may wonder if any other of the world’s countries enjoy the same distinction of having their choice of capital city completely ignored – and even ‘amended’ – by the ‘Style Guide’ writers. Having now read it from A to Z, I can assure you that they do not. 

The entire document is a rather curious mix of dictionary, grammar guide and manual for the 21st century Western politically correct. The underlying theme appears to be avoidance of causing offence – up to a point. Thus we are advised:

Ayers Rock now known as Uluru

down under Do not use to refer to Australia or New Zealand

Indian placenames the former Bombay is now known as Mumbai, Madras is now Chennai, Calcutta is now Kolkata and Bangalore is now Bengaluru

British Isles A geographical term taken to mean Great Britain, Ireland and some or all of the adjacent islands such as Orkney, Shetland and the Isle of Man. The phrase is best avoided, given its (understandable) unpopularity in the Irish Republic. Alternatives adopted by some publications are British and Irish Isles or simply Britain and Ireland

England, English should not be used when you mean Britain or British, unless you are seeking to offend readers from other parts of the UK (we published a map of England’s best beaches, with the headline “Britain’s best beaches”)

foreign accents Use accents on French, German, Portuguese, Spanish and Irish Gaelic words – and, if at all possible, on people’s names in any language, eg Sven-Göran Eriksson (Swedish), Béla Bartók (Hungarian). This may be tricky in the case of some languages but we have had complaints from readers that it is disrespectful to foreign readers to, in effect, misspell their names

foreign placenames Style for foreign placenames evolves with common usage. Leghorn has become Livorno, and maybe one day München will supplant Munich, but not yet. Remember that many names have become part of the English language: Geneva is the English name for the city that Switzerland’s French speakers refer to as Genève and its German speakers call Genf. 
Accordingly, we opt for locally used names, with these main exceptions (the list is not exhaustive, apply common sense): Archangel, Basle, Berne, Brittany, Cologne, Dunkirk, Florence, Fribourg, Genoa, Gothenburg, Hanover, Kiev, Lombardy, Milan, Munich, Naples, Normandy, Nuremberg, Padua, Piedmont, Rome, Sardinia, Seville, Sicily, Syracuse, Turin, Tuscany, Venice, Zurich. 

And the next time someone says we should call Burma “Myanmar” because that’s what it calls itself, they should bear in mind that Colonel Gaddafi renamed Libya “The Great Socialist People’s Libyan Arab Jamahiriyya”

Considerable space is given over to one particular religion, with explanations of all others being absent.  Is it therefore to be concluded that – with the exception of Islam – all Guardian writers are theological experts and therefore need no guidance on the finer points of Buddhism, Shinto, Jainism or Hinduism? 

Muhammad Our style for the prophet’s name and for most Muhammads living in Arab countries, though where someone’s preferred spelling is known we respect it, eg Mohamed Al Fayed, Mohamed ElBaradei. The spelling Mohammed (or variants) is considered archaic by most British Muslims, and disrespectful by many of them.

Ashura a day of voluntary fasting for Muslims; Shia Muslims also commemorate the martyrdom of Hussein, a grandson of the prophet, so for them it is not a festival but a day of mourning

Eid al-Adha (Festival of Sacrifice) Muslim festival laid down in Islamic law, celebrates the end of the hajj. Note that eid means festival, so it is tautologous to describe it as the “Eid festival”

Eid al-Fitr Muslim festival of thanksgiving laid down in Islamic law, celebrates the end of Ramadan (al-fitr means the breaking of the fast)

eid mubarak not a festival but a greeting (mubarak means “may it be blessed”)

hajj pilgrimage to Mecca; haji Muslim who has made such a pilgrimage

bismillah means “in the name of God” in Arabic

burqa not burka

casbah rather than kasbah

inshallah means “God willing” in Arabic

Islam means “submission to the will of God”.

Ka’bah cube-shaped shrine in the centre of the great mosque in Mecca towards which all Muslims face in prayer; the shrine is not worshipped but used as the focal point of the worship of God

Muslims should never be referred to as “Mohammedans”, as 19th-century writers did. It causes serious offence because they worship God, not the prophet Muhammad. 

“Allah” is Arabic for “God”. Both words refer to the same concept: there is no major difference between God in the Old Testament and Allah in Islam. Therefore it makes sense to talk about “God” in an Islamic context and to use “Allah” in quotations or for literary effect. 

The holy book of Islam is the Qur’an (not Koran)

Apparently, it is important not to offend Jedi through mis-spelling and climate change is deemed a touchy subject too:

lightsaber as in the official Jedi spelling

climate change terminology A sensitive area. The editor of the Guardian’s environment website says: “Climate change deniers has nasty connotations with Holocaust denial and tends to polarise debate. On the other hand there are some who are literally in denial about the evidence.”

Our guidelines are:

Rather than opening itself to the charge of denigrating people for their beliefs, a fair newspaper should always try to address what it is that people are sceptical about or deny.
 The term sceptics covers those who argue that climate change is exaggerated, or not caused by human activity.
 If someone really does claim that climate change is not happening – that the world is not warming – then it seems fair enough to call them a denier

As many have pointed out over the years, the Guardian’s insistence on referring to some terrorists as ‘militants’ appears to have something of a geographical basis to it. The 7/7 bombers in London were described as ‘terrorists’. Those who blow up public transport in Israel are militants. The style guide offers us some clues to that riddle.

terrorism, terrorists A terrorist act is directed against victims chosen either randomly or as symbols of what is being opposed (eg workers in the World Trade Centre, tourists in Bali, Spanish commuters). It is designed to create a state of terror in the minds of a particular group of people or the public as a whole for political or social ends. Although most terrorist acts are violent, you can be a terrorist without being overtly violent (eg poisoning a water supply or gassing people on the underground).

Does having a good cause make a difference? The UN says no: “Criminal acts calculated to provoke a state of terror in the general public are in any circumstances unjustifiable, whatever the considerations of a political, philosophical, ideological, racial, ethnic, religious or other nature that may be invoked to justify them.”

Whatever one’s political sympathies, suicide bombers, the 9/11 attackers and most paramilitary groups can all reasonably be regarded as terrorists (or at least groups some of whose members perpetrate terrorist acts).

Nonetheless we need to be very careful about using the term: it is still a subjective judgment – one person’s terrorist may be another person’s freedom fighter, and there are former “terrorists” holding elected office in many parts of the world. Some critics suggest that, for the Guardian, all terrorists are militants – unless their victims are British. Others may point to what they regard as “state terrorism”.

Often, alternatives such as militants, radicals, separatists, etc, may be more appropriate and less controversial, but this is a difficult area: references to the “resistance”, for example, imply more sympathy to a cause than calling such fighters “insurgents”. The most important thing is that, in news reporting, we are not seen – because of the language we use – to be taking sides.

Note that the phrase “war on terror” should always appear in quotes, whether used by us or (more likely) quoting someone else

We learn, however, that 9/11 was a terror attack and that it is fine to call Al Qaeda terrorists. 

Islamist an advocate or supporter of Islamic fundamentalism; the likes of Osama bin Laden and his followers should be described as Islamist terrorists

September 11 Use September 11 (ie contrary to our usual date style) when it is being evoked as a particular event, rather than just a date, eg: How September 11 changed the world for ever

But “how the events of 11 September 2001 changed the world for ever” would follow our normal date style. 
9/11 may be substituted for either, as necessary, particularly in tight headlines, eg:
How 9/11 changed the world for ever

The official death toll of the victims of the Islamist terrorists who hijacked four aircraft on 11 September 2001 is 2,976. The figure does not include the 19 hijackers. Of this total, 2,605 died in the twin towers of the World Trade Centre or on the ground in New York City (of whom approximately 1,600 have been identified), 246 died on the four aeroplanes, and 125 were killed in the attack on the Pentagon.
 The hijackers were: Fayez Ahmed, Mohamed Atta, Ahmed al-Ghamdi, Hamza al-Ghamdi, Saeed al-Ghamdi, Hani Hanjour, Nawaf al-Hazmi, Salem al-Hazmi, Ahmed al-Haznawi, Khalid al-Mihdhar, Majed Moqed, Ahmed al-Nami, Abdulaziz al-Omari, Marwan al-Shehhi, Mohannad al-Shehri, Wael al-Shehri, Waleed al-Shehri, Satam al-Suqami, Ziad Jarrah (though dozens of permutations of their names have appeared in the paper, we follow Reuters style as for most Arabic transliterations)

However, Hamas and other Palestinian terror organizations do not get a mention, whilst:

Hezbollah means “party of God”

Besides the translocation of its capital, what about other subjects which a Guardian Jerusalem (or should that be Tel Aviv?) correspondent may encounter? 

Zionist refers to someone who believes in the right for a Jewish national home to exist within historic Palestine; someone who wants the borders of that entity to be expanded is not an “ultra-Zionist” but might be described as a hardliner, hawk or rightwinger

West Bank barrier should always be called a barrier when referred to in its totality, as it is in places a steel and barbed-wire fence and in others an eight-metre-high concrete wall; if referring to a particular section of it then calling it a fence or a wall may be appropriate. It can also be described as a “separation barrier/fence/wall” or “security barrier/fence/wall”, according to the nature of the article

settler should be confined to those Israeli Jews living in settlements across the 1967 green line, ie in the occupied territories

six-day war between Israel and its neighbours in June 1967

occupied territories Gaza and the West Bank

Palestine is best used for the occupied territories (the West Bank and Gaza); if referring to the whole area, including Israel, use “historic Palestine” (but Palestine for historical references to the area prior to 1948)

Mossad, the Israeli secret service; note definite article

Nakba the Palestinian “catastrophe”

Haaretz Israeli newspaper; no longer has an apostrophe

 And the words barmitzvah and batmitzvah have also been given the ‘Jerusalem treatment’ as the Guardian apparently considers itself qualified to take two words in another language and fuse them into one.

If you happen to have a damp weekend ahead, here is the full Guardian and Observer Style Guide for your continued entertainment and enlightenment. 

 

 

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Mar 18 2012

Denis MacEeoin’s take-down of Peter Beaumont’s pseudo-intellectual ‘understanding’ of Iran

The prolific Denis MacEoin wrote a letter which was published in the Guardian today, March 18, in response to Peter Beaumont’s Observer essay, ”A better understanding of Iran might save us from catastrophe, March 11.

While you should read Beaumont’s apologia for the Islamic Republic in full, which (of course) vilified Israel and blamed the regime’s nuclear ambitions largely on Western belligerence, MacEeoin’s letter demonstrates a few of the more important inconvenient truths about Iran which Beaumont, for some reason, failed to include.

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Sep 18 2011

Robin Shepherd: Guardian group leads UK charge on reckless Palestinian bid for unilateral statehood

The following passage, in a Sept. 18th pro-UDI editorial, A Palestinian state is a moral right, in The Observer, sister publication of the Guardian, is a true classic:

The case for a Palestinian state is unanswerable and must be supported in the west… [emphasis mine]

Thankfully, Robin Shepherd dares to answer the “unanswerable”.

Shepherd argues, in a recent piece at The Commentator, in response to the Observer editorial and the broader efforts by the Guardian to champion Palestinian UDI: 

“No mainstream media outfit in the Western world has been more hostile to Israel than the Guardian group. On Sunday it ramped up the vitriol yet again. Stupidity or bigotry? Take your pick.”

I would personally choose both stupidity and bigotry, and Shepherd clearly concurs:

Regarding the former:

Anyone but a fool can see that this is a blatant attempt to avoid direct negotiations with Israel so as to obviate the need for the kind of concessions that meaningful negotiations always entail.

And, regarding the latter:

And anyone but a bone-headed imbecile or an implacable anti-Zionist can see that the whole enterprise is fraught with extreme dangers both for Israel itself and for the peace and stability of the entire region.

Read the rest of Shepherd’s superb take-down of the Guardian’s pro-UDI logic, here.

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Sep 26 2010

An Editorial that could not possibly be more misleading

This is cross posted by Chas Newkey-Burden at OyVaGoy

An editorial in today’s Observer [cross posted at The Guardian] presents Israel as the obstacle to peace in the Middle East and Mahmoud Abbas’s Palestinian Authority as the ones making all the moves. Indeed, it argues that “successive” Israeli prime ministers have refused to sincerely engage and negotiate with the Palestinians.

Successive Israeli prime ministers refusing to negotiate? Well, let’s look at the record of the three that preceded the current administration…

Ehud Barak (1999-2001) offered Yasser Arafat an extraordinary package including around 97 per cent of the territories, the majority of the Old City and east Jerusalem, and $30 billion compensation for the refugees.

Map reflecting the parameters of the Palestinian state which Arafat was offered (Per Dennis Ross)

His offer was refused by Arafat.

Ariel Sharon  (2001-2005) withdrew from Gaza, and was considering withdrawing from the West Bank, before his reign ended when he suffered a stroke.

The Gaza withdrawal was responded to with thousands of rockets fired into Israel.

Ehud Olmert (2006-2009) offered Mahmoud Abbas 93.5 to 93.7 per cent of the territories, along with a land swap of 5.8 per cent and a safe-passage corridor from Gaza to the West Bank. Under his offer the Old City of Jerusalem would be administered by a consortium of Saudis, Jordanians, Israelis, Palestinians and Americans. There would also have been (limited) return of refugees.

His offer was refused by Abbas

As for Netanyahu, it is too early to tell what will happen. But during his first reign as Prime Minister, (1996-1999) he negotiated with Yasser Arafat, signed the Wye River accords and handed most of Hebron to the Palestinians.

So The Observer could hardly be more misleading. Its editorial warns, with typical colonial-liberal pomposity, that if Israel continues to refuse to negotiate that it will become “an international pariah”. If that ever does become the case, it will not be because of intransigence on the part of Israel. But it will be in part because of dishonest reporting such as in today’s Observer.