Category: Journalism

JOURNALISTIC & EDITORIAL GUIDANCE: REPORTING CONFLICT IN PALESTINE

On By rebelbreezeIn Current Affairs Comment, Guerrilla Action, Israeli Zionism, Journalism, Mass Media Criticism, National Liberation, Palestine, Political AnalysisLeave a comment

Diarmuid Breatnach

(Reading time: 7 mins.)

We understand the pressure under which news media organisations are under and how easy it is to lapse into descriptions that have become common usage in the profession and so have issued this guide to greater accuracy.

TERM IN COMMON MEDIA USE

Israel-Hamas war

OUR CORRECTION

Israel-Palestinian war1

TERM IN COMMON MEDIA USE

Hamas-controlled/ Hamas takeover

OUR CORRECTION

Palestinian elected government2

Gaza Hell by Israeli bombing (Photo cred: Ahmed Zakot/SOPA Images/Sipa USA)

TERM IN COMMON MEDIA USE

Palestinian militant

OUR CORRECTION

Palestinian

TERM IN COMMON MEDIA USE

Hamas/ Palestinian terrorist

OUR CORRECTION

Hamas/ Palestinian freedom fighter

TERM IN COMMON MEDIA USE

Hamas rampage into Israel

OUR CORRECTION

Hamas breakthrough into Israeli-controlled territory

TERM IN COMMON MEDIA USE

Israel bombardment of Gaza in response to Hamas attack on October 7th

OUR CORRECTION

Israeli attack on Gaza in response to Palestinian response to 75 years of oppression, murders and massacres, including well over 200 Palestinians killed by August this year.3

TERM IN COMMON MEDIA USE

Palestinian attack on Israel

OUR CORRECTION

see above

TERM IN COMMON MEDIA USE

Israeli civilians

OUR CORRECTION

Israeli armed settlers, military reservists – and civilians

TERM IN COMMON MEDIA USE

Hamas hostages

OUR CORRECTION

prisoners of Hamas

TERM IN COMMON MEDIA USE

Palestinian prisoners

OUR CORRECTION

Hostages of Israel4

TERM IN COMMON MEDIA USE

two-state solution

OUR CORRECTION

ridiculous Palestinian ‘Bantustan’ proposal

TERM IN COMMON MEDIA USE

IDF (Israeli Defence Force)

OUR CORRECTION

IOF (Israeli Occupation Force)

TERM IN COMMON MEDIA USE

Israeli security forces

OUR CORRECTION

Israeli repression forces

TERM IN COMMON MEDIA USE

“International community”

OUR CORRECTION

Most capitalist imperialist states around the world

TERM IN COMMON MEDIA USE

Israel’s right to defence

OUR CORRECTION

Right of the Zionists to occupy land, massacre and terrorise the inhabitants, treat them as third-class citizens and massacre and terrorise again if they resist.

TERM IN COMMON MEDIA USE

Palestinians were killed/ Hamas killed Israelis

OUR CORRECTION

Israel killed Palestinians/ Hamas killed Israelis

TERM IN COMMON MEDIA USE

Jewish state

OUR CORRECTION

Zionist state

TERM IN COMMON MEDIA USE

Illegally-occupied lands outside Israel

OUR CORRECTION

Part of unjustly-occupied whole of Palestine

TERM IN COMMON MEDIA USE

Contested attribution of bombing of Al-Ahli Hospital in Gaza

OUR CORRECTION

Israeli bombing of Al-Ahli Hospital in Gaza5 after telling hospitals to evacuate

TERM IN COMMON MEDIA USE

Uncertainty around accuracy of Palestinian casualty figures

OUR CORRECTION

Absolute accuracy of Palestinian casualty figures, accepted by a wide section of international organisations including bodies of the United Nations.

FOOTNOTES

1We’re aware that the term “war” often brings to mind the air forces, armies and navies of two states in conflict and that the Palestinians have neither air force nor navy and that their army is collectively composed of guerrilla groups. Nevertheless, for convenience and in the tradition of naming armed long conflicts of liberation “wars” we consider the term useable in this context.

2Hamas won the 2006 Palestinian Legislative Elections throughout the territory – not just in Gaza but also in the West Bank. Al Fatah did not accept the results and tried to stage an armed coup in Gaza and in a short and brutal struggle were defeated by Hamas which, however left the West Bank in more-or-less Fatah hands. The then-Fatah choice for President of the Palestinian Authority, Mahmoud Abbas, remained in power and has not authorised elections since. The PA has a huge number of security personnel (over 80,000) widely regarded as brutal, repressive and colluding with the Israeli regime against Palestinians.

3The massacres by Zionist militias forced 700,000 Palestinians out of Palestine in 1948 as the State of Israel was being founded. Since then, in regular raids, massacres and bombardments, Israel had killed an estimated 65,000 Palestinians just up to 2021, after which there have been a number of bombardments of Gaza and raids into the West Bank at intervals with thousands more deaths in total. The vast majority of those `Palestinian deaths have been and continue to be those of civilians, over half of women and children, the latter over one-third.

4At the end of June 2023, the Israel Prison Service (IPS) was holding 4,499 Palestinians in detention or in prison on what it defined “security” grounds. According to recent reports, since the attack on Gaza, that number has doubled.

5For a detailed analysis both of type of Palestinian rockets and Israeli bombs re. explosion and past history https://youtu.be/7DhDKy7vARM?si=C6MWmywbFF-oNxaR

SOURCES

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palestinian_casualties_of_war

https://www.btselem.org/statistics/detainees_and_prisoners

https://www.aljazeera.com/features/2023/10/21/number-of-palestinian-prisoners-in-israel-doubles-to-10000-in-two-weeks

No Irish Need Apply to British Communist Party History

On By rebelbreezeIn Current Affairs Comment, History, Irish Diaspora, Journalism, Political Analysis, USALeave a comment

I have been sent this article from The Morning Star, newspaper of the Communist Party of Great Britain, a reprint from The People’s World, like-minded newspaper from the USA.

The article is about the removal by right-wingers in the USA of a marker commemorating worker organiser, women’s suffrage campaigner, anti-racist and anti-fascist Elizabeth Gurley Flynn in her home town of Concord, Massachusetts, USA.

https://www.morningstaronline.co.uk/article/f/60-years-after-death-elizabeth-gurley-flynn-still-scares-right

An omission in the article, which the Morning Star chose not to correct, is the Irish background of the article’s subject, class fighter Elizabeth Gurley Flynn. Is this important? It certainly was to the subject herself who, in her biography, emphasised her Irish background.

Cover of her biography (Source photo: Internet)

She wrote of the importance to her of claiming both Irish family names in her ancestry and always used them both: Gurley and Flynn. But in particular for the CPGB, operating in a state that is oppressing Ireland, it should be of importance how Irish people are represented.

Especially in a culture with a deep and long streak of anti-Irish racism.

Elizabeth Gurley Flynn speaking at a mass meeting in the USA (Source photo: Internet)

The CPGB never supported the armed struggle by Irish people against its masters nor stood up for the defence of the Irish diaspora in Britain, subject to racism in the media, to police persecution and to judicial and legal racism in the 1970s, ’80s and ’90s.

This is despite the enormous contribution of the Irish diaspora to the trade union and socialist movement in Britain in shop stewards, activists and leaders.

International Workers of the World (‘Wobblies) organisers: Elizabeth Gurley Flynn (centre) next to Big Bill Haywood (right). (Source photo: Internet)

With Bronterre O’Brien and Fergus O’Connor, the Irish diaspora gave the British working class two leaders of the first mass movement of workers in Britain, the Chartists. The anthem of the class, The Red Flag, was composed by Jim Connell from Co. Meath (though they used the wrong air).

And the classic novel of the class, The Ragged-Trousered Philanthropists, was penned by Robert Tressel, pen-name of Robert Noonan, born and reared in Dublin.

The CPGB in fact has a long association with British colonialism and its very title is an indication of that.

End.

Left: Famous photo of Gurley Flynn as a public speaker. Right: The marker in her hometown now removed by right-wingers there. (Photo sourced: Internet)

REFERENCE:

https://www.morningstaronline.co.uk/article/f/60-years-after-death-elizabeth-gurley-flynn-still-scares-right

The Rebel Girl: An Autobiography, My First Life (1906-1926). New York: International Publishers, 1973. 

AN PHOBLACHT ABÚ – NEW SOCIALIST REPUBLICAN NEWSPAPER

On By rebelbreezeIn Current Affairs Comment, Housing Struggle, Imperialism, Ireland, Irish Left, Irish Republicanism, Journalism, National Liberation, Political Analysis, Socialist Revolution5 Comments

Diarmuid Breatnach

(Reading time: 2 mins.)

A new socialist Irish Republican hardcopy newspaper has appeared in Ireland in recent months. January and February 2023’s editions, believed to be nos. 3 & 4 are reviewed here.

HARD-COPY NEWSPAPERS

While today, at least in the developed world, the production of Internet media is of great importance for the revolutionary movement as much as it is for the capitalist system, the hard-copy newspaper disseminated by hand still has an important role.

Hardcopy newspaper distribution entails contact in the real world with real people, answers given to questions asked and challenges made, contacts made between the potential organisers and potential activist supporters, can go from hand to hand and be left for a random reader.

Online media has no equivalent to this.

Lenin observed that the revolutionary newspaper is an organiser, not only in its calls to action but in the necessary tasks of production and distribution. Ireland has very few revolutionary newspapers and not even one weekly one, to say nothing of daily editions.

An Phoblacht Abú is produced and distributed by Irish Republican Socialists, whose activist manifestations have been seen in the Revolutionary Housing League’s occupation of empty buildings and its calls for a general emulation of such actions.

Another manifestation has been the activities of Anti-Imperialist Action, notably in protest pickets against imperialism and neo-colonialism, antifascist actions and anti-spiking campaigns, also in commemorations of Republican martyrs, often supported by sticker and leaflet campaigns.

An Phoblacht Abú Front January 2023, front page.

CONTENT, FORM AND PRICE

Both issues reviewed contained 16 sides of A4 pages, composed of two A3 sheets folded in half, one inside the other. They sold at 2 euros per issue – less than one-third the price of most pints in Dublin and much longer to consume!

In general the articles are well-written and with few typographical errors. The editions reviewed here covered national and international news and the overall line in the content is of revolutionary overthrow of the ruling class and eschewing electoralism.

With regard to coverage of national issues, anti-fascism, anti-racism, building a broad front, opposition to NATO and the British occupation of the Six Counties and the neo-colonial and neo-liberal ruling class of the Twenty-Six Counties have figured prominently.

Apart from such regular themes, January’s issue documented the struggle against student fees and treachery of the student union executive in Maynooth and reported a joint Republican Prisoners’ solidarity picket in Dublin along with the release of a known Loyalist sectarian murderer.

Commemorations of Irish Republicans murdered by the Free State during the Irish Civil War/ Counter Revolution (1922-1923) figured in both issues.

In foreign news coverage, actions of peoples’ guerrilla forces in the Philippines and India, for which one would search the main dailies in vain, are covered in both issues and, in January’s, Scottish independence and John McLean and Israeli expulsion of Palestinian campaigner Salah Hamouri.

The environmental struggle in Germany figured in February’s issue.

Regarding economic questions, the rise in “cost of living” and housing crisis attacks on working people were addressed in short articles. Wider pieces on action were included on class struggle and community representation and action in the February edition.

LOOKING AHEAD

The appearance of An Phoblacht Abú is welcome and it is hoped can be sustained. Hopefully further issues will deal with questions of culture and the Irish language, the war in Ukraine (on which the Left seems deeply divided), historical-cultural conservation, trade union organisation and education of the people.

AVAILABLEat 2 euro per copy (back issues sometimes free) from sellers and supporters or from irsmedia@protonmail.com

End.