The BBC is right not to show the Gaza aid campaign

Gaza Protesters

Just when you think all maybe quiet on the White City front, splashed across the print media is a flurry of critique of the beeb from the Mail to the Times. 

The BBC carries on into this year like a series of one of its hit tragic comedies and Television Centre risks becoming a Fawlty Tower in its own right.  You find yourself cringing as they painfully make a greater mess of what is a simple situation.  Like Basil Fawlty dealing with his german guests, if the BBC were more careful, tactful with their response this would not have got so out of hand.

This television appeal, which is still being edited today for tonight’s broadcast on ITV, C4 and Five, is partial: it is aimed at helping one-side of a war.  You may agree with me that Israel’s actions were absolutely abhorrent and you may like me be about to make a donation to the Red Cross to help the families of Gaza rebuild their shattered lives.  But why should an international news network, famed around the world for its impartiality take a public line and advertise an appeal for one side in an armed conflict?  Were we not aware of the suffering after weeks of coverage?  We are certainly aware of the DEC campaign now, more so than we would have been had the BBC agreed to air it.  In fact, paradoxically the BBC may have done the campaign a favour through this extra publicity and furore which may come at the expense of disgruntled viewers tuning elsewhere for a time.

This whole situation has been born out of the fervent anti-BBC movement amongst elements of the media and politicians who have been brandishing their teeth and led by the antithesis of impartiality The Daily Mail.  Why has Sky News not been criticised, they have not (at the time of writing 5am gmt) not even made up their minds on whether to show the footage or not.  Are they then not heartless for not even deciding on what 11,000 people, 50 MPs, and Britain’s religious leaders see as essential viewing and sitting on the fence? Have they no conscience no standards?  At least the BBC said no.  Why hasn’t CNN been asked to air this campaign, it broadcasts  in Britain and internationally.  Could it not use its airwaves to raise relief for Gazans?  What about Al Jazeera:  the voice of the voiceless, should they not be vocal for this appeal?

The answer as mean spirited as it may sound is no.  All these outlets are there to inform, not to push people so directly in coming down on oneside and by opening up their wallets at the end of news bulletin.  In the last week, the international media has been very good at showing the shear devastation after watching from the sidelines of the Gaza border since 27^th December (with the exception of Al Jazeera who were the only news network in Gaza during the Israeli onslaught). We as the viewer must then take that information and decide whether we let the news roll on to Eastenders or Fawlty Towers re-runs.  We must not have the news followed by an advert which compels to feel one way or another.  Aid agencies already indirectly advertise themselves in war zones by appearing on news programmes talking about the Congo, Darfur or Gaza and give their causes publicity and air time without the need of free airspace and a slanted ad.

 That is the argument the BBC should be making and doing so as candidly as some of their reports from Gaza.  So when a BBC spokesperson is pressed on a radio debate about whether or not there is a “humanitarian crisis” and they try and squirm – like an interviewee on the Today Show – their way out of referring it as one, so as not to weaken their position further in the hostile public environment the beeb now has in the publics eyes.  They should instead stand firm and say: “there is a humanitarian crisis, and we have been reporting on it day in an day out, it is up to the viewers to decide how they react to our impartial reporting on the ground”.  That should be that and the BBC should not be expected spoon feed morals to the public.  If Douglas Alexander and the Archbishop of Canterbury want people to donate money to Gaza they can come and explain why on air or have a whip round the pulpits of Westminster, but not by way of an ad on our news programmes.