The BBC, in all it’s infinite wisdom, has today decided not to give any air-time to a humanitarian disaster aid appeal.
They give 2 reasons.
The first is that they are unsure of the means of delivering the aid.
The second is that they fear it might impart some doubt on the impartiality of their reporting of the situation.
The appeal has come from the Disasters Emergency Committee and is for sending and distributing humanitarian aid in Gazza using a network comprising of some 13 aid agencies.
So for their first reason the BBC have decided that they are far better informed to make such a judgement than the Disasters Emergency Committee. I think not.
As to their second reason I would say a couple of things.
First of all, any humanitarian disaster, whoever or wherever it is, stands head-and-shoulders above questions of impartiality in the “importance stakes”.
Second, I would question that impartiality in relation to the Palestine/Israel situation over the last 60 years or so. It has followed the “impartiality” of most of the western powers since Israel was re-formed. It’s a kind of thinking that isn’t followed by everybody. It’s one of the reasons we are in the current mess we are in.
Anyway who the hell do the BBC think they are telling us which appeals are good for us or not? Getting a bit too bloody arrogant methinks. Too “control freak”.
This really is disgraceful behaviour by the BBC and needs a very quick U-turn and then I think some heads should roll. Let’s make sure it’s the ones at the top this time and not the usual suspects.
