Tag: Mass Media Criticism

Jason Arday: Does anyone come out of it well?

On By rebelbreezeIn Cultural Comment, Current Affairs Comment, Mass Media Criticism, Political Analysis, RacismLeave a comment

Gearóid Ó Loinsigh (Republished from author’s substack with permission, reformatted for Rebel Breeze)

(Reading time: 8 mins.)

The Jason Arday affair has left few standing, least of all those who think they are not only standing but standing tall.

Lots of people came out of it very badly. Nathan Cofnas is one, as is Jason Arday himself as well as the media, Cambridge University and academia in general and also the Left.

Jason Arday in Cambridge University (Photo arrangement credit: The Herald)

Before the story broke Nathan Cofnas was even by academic standards an obscure figure. He is now a household name, not just in Britain, but globally. He describes himself as a “race realist” something the media and others are treating as something respectable or new.

It is neither. Race Realism and the search to find a biological link to intelligence is not new. 

Biological Determinism goes back a long way and enjoyed social and even scientific support in the 19th Century through the work of Francis Galton (Darwin’s cousin), the father of eugenics who unsurprisingly had studied at Cambridge.

It reached ridiculous levels assigning all sorts of non-sensical biological criteria by which to measure intelligence. Farcically at one point the size of certain bones was seen as a biological (racial) sign of intelligence: the ratio of the radius to the humerus to be precise.

This rubbish never went away and resurfaced time and again. The genetic discussion is just a modern version of it, which found its expression in The Bell Curve by Richard Herrnstein and Charles Murray in 1994.[1] 

At the time many liberal and left wing scientists demolished the arguments and Stephen Jay Gould even debated Murray, something most on the Left would be now ill-prepared to do after years of cancel culture and “winning” arguments by saying they are offended.

Cofnas has added nothing new to the debate, not even from a right-wing perspective, though as Gould pointed out in his updated edition of The Mismeasure of Man, Murray too had only regurgitated old arguments with lots of charts and stats to accompany them.

Which is something Cofnas also does: style over substance. But he has exposed the shallowness of what is considered intellectually worthy in academia, both in terms of his own contributions and also Arday’s.

I am all in favour of free inquiry at universities and in life in general, but Biological Determinism or its modern synonym Race Realism is nothing short of quackery.

It belongs in the same category as Flat Earth Science or even Creationism, though Cambridge actually has a Faculty of Divinity i.e. quackery. That Cambridge and Ghent took it seriously is a damning indictment of both places.

All education is political, what is taught, what courses are offered, the range of opinions etc. Education is a battleground for ideas, some of which seem obscure and irrelevant but which end up shaping our society, albeit indirectly in some cases.

Given the level of moralistic hysteria doing the rounds on this topic it has been impossible to ask certain sectors to step back and take a look at the facts and then proceed on that basis. Cambridge has belatedly set up an independent review of how it handled the Arday affair and also how it came to appoint him in the first place.[2] 

Was racism a factor in what happened to Arday? Almost certainly. The question is to what degree and none of that takes away from the fact the racists had the goods on him. When I say racists I mean the right wingers like Cofnas. Though I could mean the racists who hired him.

It is clear that Cambridge is institutionally racist. It could not be any other way given its history, current links to the arms trade, the low number of black academics etc.

So they hired Arday, as a poster boy, as Jason Okundaye put it “Arday was treated not as a scholar but as a mascot, one who was particularly expedient for an institution that had been regularly embarrassed by its historic record on race”.[3] 

They were saying look at what we have done. It is the academic equivalent of “I am not racist, some of my friends are black”. It is clear that Cambridge sought to deflect criticism by hiring someone regardless of whether they met the requirements.

Maybe they thought this offset having “race realists” like Cofnas, or right wingers like Reform UK’s James Orr on the payroll and even inviting people like Murray to give talks at the university.

But Cofnas was not the first academic to question Arday’s record.

Another academic, David Harris, whilst researching a book he was writing on race tried to raise questions the way academics do, gently, politely through the system and was accused of harassment and reported to the police by Arday.

He had been told that he should read Arday’s work for his own research and he did and found some problems with it.[4] 

Had his questions received the consideration they deserved, the whole affair might not have played out the way it did and Arday might not have a job, or he may have received some disciplinary sanction, but he might still be alive.

It was the reaction to Harris, a mild-mannered academic who unlike Cofnas has no agenda in the matter, that increased the pressure in the pot and helped set the scene.

There was also the police persecution of Times Higher Education journalist Jack Grove, where the police acted like a private security firm for Arday putting him under investigation for four months.[5]

As a result of the affair, other issues have come to light, or rather have gained wider traction than they otherwise would. Academia is hardly an enthralling newsworthy issue at the best of times.

It has been pointed out that other white people at Cambridge had been found guilty by Cambridge itself of plagiarism and nothing happened to them just mild disciplinary sanctions in the best of cases. One of them even plagiarised his own student!

Cambridge protects its own. Arday, despite being their poster boy was not and when it came time to cut him loose they let him resign, something which seems to have genuinely shocked many on the Left.

It has other problems with sexism. Coming just days before Arday’s suicide the courts found in favour of Professor Wyn Evans, a lecturer in astrophysics, who fought a long battle against Cambridge over the treatment of a female colleague, Dr Tausch-Pebody.

The case revolved around a complaint made against Dr McMahon who had held up the disbursement of funding to her by 37 weeks refusing to sign the appropriate release form and had bizarrely used her IP address and that of other colleagues.

The university used its insurance funds to fight the case, and was nasty about it, with Wyn Evans saying “At one point the university’s barrister accused me of crying crocodile tears about an employee who committed suicide”[6] which is a bit rich given the howls around Arday’s suicide.

Following the tribunal report, other academics posted a picture of Judas on his door and Cambridge announced it was reviewing its HR procedures, following its bullying of this whistleblower.[7] 

This judgement came in the midst of the furore surrounding Arday’s appointment clearly showing that Cambridge is not the type of employer which facilitates internal criticism of its decisions.

The Left responded by defending Arday and when backed into an indefensible corner said “Well lots of people plagiarise and embellish their CV”. To be clear he didn’t embellish his CV, he fabricated it.

Embellishing it would mean exaggerating accomplishments, not completely inventing them. But on the plagiarism issue they have also pointed to various academics found guilty of plagiarism who were not sacked. Yes, those academics should be sacked.

Saying white upper class people got away with plagiarism is not a defence, it is an accusation levelled at the academic institution. Unwittingly they have exposed part of the corruption at the heart of academia.

The Left’s proposal was that if whites can commit crimes, or falsify records the solution is to demand equal rights for everyone to do so, rather than say this should be rooted out.

This is partly because the identity politics industry is not controlled by working-class blacks or Asians but by the white, black and Asian middle-class and they have no intention of upsetting the apple cart they are eating from.

However, it is disingenuous to believe that it was all about racism. Arday fell on his sword because he was not qualified for the job and his backstory was the work of a fantasist whose skills would have been better suited to writing sci-fi literature or something.

If it was just racism, why did the racists not manage to force the other black academics at Cambridge out of a job. The racists had a field day with Arday, but only because the patronising racists who employed him overlooked his qualifications and backstory.

Surprisingly, Liverpool John Moore’s university that awarded Arday his PhD has fared better than can be expected, but only because it has received less attention.

But at some point Cambridge will wash their hands entirely of Arday and pass the buck downstream to Liverpool John Moore’s and then perhaps they may not look so well.

This may happen at some point during the review when their defence will most certainly be that Arday and Liverpool John Moore’s conned them.

The media haven’t come out of it well either and I don’t say that because of the pile-on but because as I have pointed out lots of issues arose in the course of the discussion, which the media decided not to pursue.

Like the plagiarism of other academics, like Cofnas’ modern Flat Earth Science type of stuff on intelligence actually getting recognition, none of which was raised, nor will it be, by neither the Left nor the media.

The Left also don’t come out of it well. Their response to the media coverage was to deny the facts of the case. If Arday was treated unfairly by the media, then that argument can’t be made on the basis that he did no wrong. Even some identitarians have argued this.

One of the few left papers in Britain to examine the issue rationally, The Weekly Worker (CPGB) made the point.

He was undoubtedly the tragic victim of an openly racist attack dog and a baying mainstream media.

However, maintaining that Jason Arday was not guilty of plagiarism is worse than useless. We need the truth about him and, more importantly, the whole neoliberal university system.[8]

Instead of asking for that, the Left has now proposed a law limiting media coverage of individuals. The utter stupidity of the Left never ceases to amaze me.

Some of the repression of the Palestinian solidarity movement around the world is being carried out through just the type of measures the Left has called for around hate speech, personal offence etc. You would think they would learn about it coming back to bite them. But no.

Right now Tommy Robinson and other right wing activists are floating in Cypriot swimming pools laughing and thinking about the Left pushing for a law they will be able to use to restrict media coverage of their pool trips and other less than savoury activities.

Even the practicalities of the law have not been thought out. Would it be overall coverage? Could The Sun use up all the media quota, leaving others with no right to comment on an issue? Or will it be per media outlet? When an outlet used up its quota, could it talk about new developments?

The stupidity of it all is beyond comprehension.

Though many of the Left organisations say they stand by Arday, they don’t. They stand by Cambridge, first and foremost, along with its handling of Arday’s appointment and they are standing by academia and its identity politics tokenistic approach to inequality.

Many on the Left actually earn a living from the tokenism and some of the leaders are well ensconced in academia, so they were never going to say much in any case. They are standing by the identity politics industry, academic corruption and their own grifting.

The Arday affair has exposed academia and the Left as having little to really say about inequality or access to university for working-class people of any race, and not much to say about racism either.

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Note: You may wish to read other articles by Gearóid Ó Loingsigh on his substack https://gearoidloingsigh.substack.com/

NOTES

[1] For an in-depth analysis of the history of Biological Determinism see revised edition of Gould, S.J. (1996) The Mismeasure of Man. W.W. Norton & Co. New York.

[2] University of Cambridge (04/09/2026) University of Cambridge launches independent review following the death of Professor Jason Arday. https://www.cam.ac.uk/news/university-of-cambridge-launches-independent-review-following-the-death-of-professor-jason-arday

[3] The Guardian (06/08/2026) The takedown of Jason Arday has overjoyed the right, and must be a wake-up call for the left. Jason Okundaye.  https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2026/aug/06/jason-arday-dei-race-issues-university-of-cambridge

[4] See The Professor who warned Cambridge about Jason Arday. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E3-kCe-ND_k

[5] The Heartlands Tribune (06/08/2026) The Case of the Journalist, the Professor and the Police Investigation. Paul Knaggs. https://heartlandstribune.com/the-case-of-the-journalist-the-professor-and-the-police-investigation/

[6] The Times (30/08/2026) Inside Cambridge bullying row that Judas pinned to professor’s door. George Odling & Nicola Woolcock.https://www.thetimes.com/uk/education/article/university-of-cambridge-whistleblowing-case-f8gfqxszb?

[7] The Telegraph (13/08/2026) Cambridge to review all HR procedures. Albert Tait. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2026/08/13/university-cambridge-review-all-hr-procedures-jason-arday/

[8] Weekly Worker (27/08/2026) Fraudsters, great and small. https://weeklyworker.co.uk/worker/1598/fraudsters-great-and-small/

NEW YEAR’S WISHES 2026 … AND REALITY

On By rebelbreezeIn Anti-War, Cultural Comment, Current Affairs Comment, Genocide, Imperialism, Internationalist Solidarity, Ireland, Journalism, Mass Media Criticism, NATO, Police Violence, Political Analysis, Political Prisoners, Popular ResistanceLeave a comment

Diarmuid Breatnach

(Reading time: 2 mins.)

As the northern hemisphere turned eastwards and the majority western calendar turned to a new year, it has been customary for people to wish one another a ‘Happy New Year’, not just for the first day of January but for the twelve months to come.

Although the Celtic New Year will not begin until the first of February, and the new year begins with “teacht an Earraigh … tar éis na Féile Brighde”, I have done likewise but with deep feelings of ambivalence.

Because facing us as 2026 progresses is genocide in some parts of the world, growing fascism in some other parts, tighter squeezes on working people, smaller proxy wars and, almost certainly, a larger war, with desperate migrations of people, if surviving death to find racism and exploitation.

Faced with armed occupation and genocide, armed resistance is justified and arguably necessary, even were it not established as a right within the Geneva Convention. But even unarmed and peaceful resistance is being penalised and repressed, including in the ‘Western democracies.’

Support and solidarity organisations are being outlawed, people expressing legitimate opinions against genocide, racism, ethnic cleansing and armed occupation supported by those ‘democracies’ are being hounded in their jobs and private lives, beaten and arrested by police and even shot dead.

But where there is oppression there is also resistance. The struggles against the racist and genocidal entity, though supported in arms, finance and politically by the Western ‘democracies’ have awoken people in those countries to solidarity action in the face of their governments’ opposition.

(Cartoon by D.Breatnach)

Hugely important lessons have been learned: about the nature of the Zionist state, about the collusion of the ‘democracies’ in colonial occupation and genocide, about ‘the independence of the judiciary’ and the ‘free press’, along with the partiality and ineffectiveness of ‘international law’.

And also about the ineffectiveness of liberal opinion and organisations, even in their heartlands of the ‘democracies’, to achieve meaningful change or even stop the repression. And about how the State knows this and reacts most violently against direct solidarity action.

Organic links have become clear between war in Yemen and Somalia, the spread of Islamist jihadism and imperialism, between prison struggles in Palestine, Britain and Ireland, between the troubles of the world and much of their origins among the colonial and imperial powers.

Yes, where there is repression, there is also resistance and our duty lies in feeding that resistance in all the ways that we can, including being visible in protests at their trials and supporting them in jail. And impeding our ruling class’ attempts to tie us to NATO or other military alliance.

So what I wish for is an increase in the militant resistance of the masses and greater unity in struggle, simultaneously with greater disunity among the imperialist states and ruling classes, bringing us closer to the kind of world we need.

I wish that for us all throughout 2026.

End.

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RTE’s Biased Coverage of Palestine and Sinn Féin’s Call for a Review

On By rebelbreezeIn Cartoon comment, Censorship & Witch-hunting, Current Affairs Comment, Imperialism, Ireland, Irish Left, Irish Republicanism, Israeli Zionism, Journalism, National Liberation, Palestine, Political AnalysisLeave a comment

Gearóid Ó Loingsigh (25 November 2024)

(Reading time: 8 mins.)

NB: Edited by RB from original article for formatting purposes

Sinn Féin has said that it would ask for a review of the national broadcaster RTE’s biased coverage of Palestine and other international conflicts.  They were criticised by almost all and sundry for doing so. 

They were accused of censorship and their own use of lawsuits to silence critics was raised once again.[1] 

The National Union of Journalists (NUJ) came out with guns blazing, claiming it would be in breach “of the principles of the European Media Freedom Act and would set a dangerous precedent in terms of direct and indirect State interference in the remit of the existing regulatory body.”[2]

The NUJ has rarely challenged what it sees as state or private interference in the media before and less still at RTE.  RTE’s board is made up of cronies and business interests, people whose interest is served by limited coverage of financial and other issues. 

Many of them come from the financial sector.  Six of the eleven board members are appointed by the Minister for Communications, so there is already government interference in RTE.

The NUJ itself would not come out well of such a review, if the review were honest. For decades it implemented Section 31 of the Broadcasting Act, censoring Sinn Féin, even when the party was standing in elections.

A brave RTE journalist Jenny McGeever was sacked because she broadcast one sentence from Martin McGuinness, “If that is ok with the Police, that is ok with us”, in reference to arrangements for the transport of three IRA volunteers’ bodies back to Belfast.[3] 

It was an innocuous statement.  The NUJ did next to nothing to defend her.  They did not defend her just as they meekly accepted the sacking of the RTE Authority in 1972.  Colum Kenny commenting on his time at RTE remarked that:

During my years at RTÉ, I became for a period what is known as ‘The Father’, or chairman, of the Programmes Chapel of the National Union of Journalists. I found no great appetite among its members, or indeed among the membership of another union representing many producers, for industrial action aimed at drawing public attention to the existence of the gagging Order known as Section 31.[4]

In other words, neither the union nor the members did anything about it.  They either agreed with it or decided the truth was not that important, not as important as their careers. 

The union will not look well, if coverage on Palestine is looked at, nor will it come out shining if coverage of Ukraine is also included, as on this issue, the union itself intervened directly in helping to shape a narrative at odds with reality.

It is as clear as day that on Palestine, Irish coverage has been very biased, in terms of who it gave interviews to, the issues it refers to and the kid gloves that apologists for genocide such as the Israeli Ambassador have been treated with. 

It is clear even in the language used.  The word ‘genocide’ is never used in reporting, unless quoting someone and even then, sparingly.  It is referred to as ‘the war’, ‘the conflict’ etc. 

It has mainly used the term when reporting on the case taken to the International Court of Justice and gave a succinct but incorrectly limited definition of what genocide is. 

It stated “In short, genocide is the intentional destruction of a people in whole or in part.”[5]  The definition is actually a lot broader than that and Gaza fits the bill on various counts.[6]

When reporting on the murder of civilians in Palestine, it never uses such terms.  It says ‘killed’ and the casualty figures are always referred to as “According to the Hamas-run Ministry of Health”. 

The message is clear, that these figures come from an organisation that is considered to be a terrorist group and therefore the figures are not reliable.  But it is actually the elected government. 

The last time there was an election in Palestine, Hamas won, both in Gaza and in the West Bank, though it only assumed power in Gaza with the Vichy Palestine Authority appointed by Mahmoud Abbas undemocratically taking control of the West Bank. 

So, of course the Ministry of Health is run by the elected government.  This language is never used in relation to Israel, we are never told “according to the Likud-run Ministry of Defence”.  In fact, such caveats are almost never used, not even when quoting the most vile dictatorships in the world.

  At best, they state “according to an official government communiqué”, which is technically correct and does not have the same moral =laden judgement contained within it.

In Lebanon, they engage in a similar sleight of hand, referring to attacks on “Hezbollah strongholds”, which is the type of language they hope will give some justification to the bombings.  But what are Hezbollah strongholds?  They are areas in which the organisation has mass support.

You would be hard pressed to find in the media, in general, and RTE in particular any significant explanation of what Hezbollah is. 

Many viewers hearing about strongholds being bombed would not know and are never informed that what this means is areas in which the organisation has a support base, which is also electoral. 

We know which areas are Hezbollah strongholds because they are the areas where people voted for them.  It is an electoral and military force, increasing its number of parliamentary seats in the 2022 elections from 13 to 15, though its allies in parliament lost seats. 

But the point is, it is a force with a huge popular base.

Likewise, when Israel told Irish UN soldiers to leave, the President of Ireland described it as a threat — but the media was more hesitant. 

When Israel then used UN compounds as shields in their attacks, the resulting damage was described as damage caused by the exchange of fire between the two.  You would never guess that one of the sides deliberately used them as protective shields.

In terms of RTE bias and coverage, whilst it has reported on Palestine over the years, once October 7th happened, the official discourse emanating from RTE and most other media outlets was that history began on October 7th. 

No attempt was made to look at the history of the region, nor the context of Israeli aggression and crimes against humanity prior to October 7th.  Previous Israeli attacks and crimes were rarely if ever mentioned. 

It made one attempt at explaining what Hezbollah was in an article published on its site.[7] 

The article recognises that it has political support, but constantly refers to the fact that it is designated as a terrorist organisation by the US and that other bastion of democracy, Saudi Arabia, whose leaders have never been elected. 

Saudi Arabia, despite having a nominal parliament is led by a bunch of royal head-chopping kleptocrats.  Though RTE quotes them favourably as a source of analysis on the nature of Hezbollah. 

The organisation is according to RTE nothing more than a group that “…has risen from a shadowy faction to a heavily armed force with major sway over the Lebanese state. The United States, some Western governments and others deem it a terrorist organisation.”

The headline on the piece reduces Hezbollah to just being a group that supports Hamas. And that was about it from RTE on the nature of the organisation.

Likewise in Ukraine, though RTE had reported on the country previously, once again history started on a particular date, this time February 22nd 2022. 

They ignored the 2014 Maidan Coup, the breaking of the Minsk Accords by Ukraine, the repression of non-Ukrainian cultures, which included not just Russians but also gypsies and others. 

The promotion of WWII fascist Stepan Bandera, the fascist nature of the Azov Battalion were all ignored to favour a simplistic account.  Previous acts such as the burning to death of trade unionists in Odessa by fascists in 2014 were never mentioned again. 

RTE presenters even questioned why NATO wasn’t pushing for all-out war with Russia, and they included in that the possibility of going to the brink of nuclear war. 

The Irish Times has recently doubled down on this, basically resurrecting the “Russia will invade and attack everyone scenario” so common when the war began.

It argued in a piece written by Kier Gillespie from the right-wing think tank Chatham House that Ireland should abandon its “neutrality” and Europe should get ready for all-out war with Russia.[8]  Incidentally, a sentiment echoed to some degree by the “pro NATO left” in the Irish parliament.

The NUJ for its part, whose members push the narrative on Palestine and Ukraine were not content with the complicity of its members in a particular narrative but organised a protest to skew the debate altogether. 

Shortly after the war started the NUJ organised a protest at the Russian Embassy to protest the lack of press freedom and attacks on journalists by the Russian state.  The Russian state has a dreadful record on the matter, but so does Ukraine. 

Moreover, in its attempt to portray the Russians as the only threat to freedom of the press the NUJ invited ambassadors from other countries to join in with it at the protest. 

Fine, except with one exception, those ambassadors represented countries with a poor record in the matter, such as Georgia, Poland and Ukraine coming in 89th, 66th and 106th respectively in Reporters Without Borders Press Freedom Index for the year 2022. 

By doing this the NUJ set a narrative that the only threat to press freedom was Putin and whitewashed a number of regimes with dubious records themselves. 

Whilst it has condemned the deaths of journalists in Gaza it did not protest at the Israeli Embassy but held a vigil instead at an art gallery.[9]  You couldn’t make such cowardice up.

So, an investigation of bias in the coverage of conflicts would be welcome.  Neither Sinn Féin, RTE, nor the NUJ would come out of it well.  But the problem is political. 

The reason why RTE does that, is that it gets away with it because there is no challenge to its bias. Sinn Féin and the Irish left represented by such stalwarts of mediocrity like People Before Profit, applauded and egged on the push for war and bias about Ukraine.

They now find the media supporting those same reactionary forces (NATO, US, EU) in their assault on Palestine.  The penny has almost dropped for them, but not quite.  RTE was biased on Ukraine and they agreed with it, now it is biased on Palestine and it is too late. 

But RTE and the Irish media in general represent the interests of the Irish state and so it should come as no surprise that it is biased. 

This does not mean we should accept it lying down, but you can’t call for bias on one issue in favour of a NATO proxy (Ukraine) and against bias in favour of another proxy, Israel.  The two are linked.

In the case of Palestine, the NUJ is passive, passing resolutions and issuing communiqués. 

As with the Irish censorship law Section 31, the union is content to not take any industrial action on the issue and let its members lie, downplay the seriousness of it all, treat the Israelis with kid gloves and use language that deliberately distorts what is happening. 

Their role in echoing Their Master’s Voice should be exposed, though Sinn Féin is not the best -placed organisation to do so, given its prioritising of its relations with Washington and its own attempts to censor Palestinians in Ireland who did not follow the Palestine Authority line.

NB: For more articles by Gearóid see https://gearoidloingsigh.substack.com

[1] Irish Examiner (19/11/2024) LIVE: Election 2024 — Sinn Féin promises ‘peer review’ of RTÉ’s Gaza coverage if elected. Paul Hosford and Cianan Brennan. https://www.irishexaminer.com/news/politics/arid-41519792.html

[2] RTE (20/11/2024) McDonald defends Sinn Féin plan to review RTÉ’s Gaza coverage.  Tommy Meskill. https://www.rte.ie/news/election-24/2024/1120/1481906-ireland-politics/

[3] Sunday Business Post (20/04/2003) How RTE censored its censorship. Niall Meehan.  Archived at CAIN https://cain.ulster.ac.uk/othelem/media/meehan/meehan03.htm

[4] Colum Kenny (2005 ) Chapter 5 Censorship, Not ‘Self-Censorship’ https://doras.dcu.ie/24076/1/Kenny,%20Colum.pdf

[5] RTE (11/01/2024) Explained: Ireland’s position on the genocide case against Israel. Juliette Gash. https://www.rte.ie/news/2024/0111/1425974-genocide-case/

[6] See Genocide Convention https://ihl-databases.icrc.org/en/ihl-treaties/genocide-conv-1948/article-2?activeTab=undefined

[7] RTE (31/10/2023) What is Hezbollah, the group backing Hamas against Israel? https://www.rte.ie/news/world/2023/1031/1413861-hezbollah-lebanon/

[8] Irish Times (23/11/2024) If Russia is indeed planning an attack against a Nato state, distance and neutrality will provide no defence.  Keir Gillespie.  https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/2024/11/23/if-russia-is-indeed-planning-an-attack-against-a-nato-state-distance-and-neutrality-will-provide-no-defence/?fbclid=IwY2xjawGxRsdleHRuA2FlbQIxMQABHVXgrcEEXPDpG2Am4EF_a_67yPZPmEio-r1l3dlQxOftB3W7EWIxEl8S_w_aem_LGtv72o-qvSLNNgSLdrWrw

[9] NUJ (30/04/2024) Dublin vigil for slain journalists. https://www.nuj.org.uk/resource/dublin-vigil-for-slain-journalists.html

CENSORSHIP OVER PALESTINE EXPOSES SHAM OF WESTERN ‘FREE PRESS’

On By rebelbreezeIn Civil Rights, Current Affairs Comment, Imperialism, Mass Media Criticism, Middle East, Palestine, Political AnalysisLeave a comment

Diarmuid Breatnach

(Reading time: 2 mins.)

The image of freedom of the press in Western society has been undermined by the biased reporting of the corporate media and yet further by the wave of censorship of social media in recent years, including blocking media platforms.

Time and again readers have seen that the version of events reported is that which favours the western powers and if and when the latter’s enemies are reported it is done perfunctorily and often with an air of doubt.

In war zones, the reporters for western media tend to be embedded among western military and rarely among their opponents.

Media censorship was already rife on reporting the war in Ukraine but has spread higher and wider during the current ‘Israeli’ genocide in Palestine, causing increasing numbers of people to resort to social media news and commentary platforms. But these alternatives too are targeted in turn.

The Western powers have attacked social media platforms such as Telegram, arresting its founder a few days ago1 and this week blocking to subscribers throughout the European Union the Resistance News Network, which reported throughout the day on events in the ‘Israeli’ genocide on Telegram.

Pavel Durov, founder of Telegram, currently under French State arrest. (Image sourced: Internet)

Earlier this month the FBI raided the homes of two US citizens, Scott Ritter and Dimitri K. Simes, journalists whose broadcasting has been hosted by Russian media,2 in alleged concern over possible Russian interference in the Presidential elections (!).

Both men have been critical of US foreign policy, which is likely the reason for intimidation through house searches, the same going for the UK police ‘welcome home’ upon Heathrow arrival of Richard Medhurst, an independent journalist and his arrest under ‘Anti-Terrorism’ law.3

Censorship in Reporting the War in Ukraine

Ukraine war news censorship has been running since 2014 but it really ramped up when Russia invaded in 2022. Any prominent individual or site, whether pro-Russia or just NATO-critical that challenged or did not follow the western imperialist line, was soon subjected to censorship.

Pablo González, a dual-nationality Basque reporter, was threatened by Ukrainian intelligence agents and then arrested and jailed in Poland, allegedly for spying for Russia. No evidence was produced during the 886 days he was jailed but now he’s released4 they claim they have a lot.

The Russia-based site RT America was closed down in the USA in 2022,5 as was RT UK in the UK.6

Oliver Stone’s documentary Ukraine On Fire was removed from YouTube7 and veteran conflict reporter and author Christopher Hedges, who left his post as Middle East reporter for the New York Times because of the paper’s censorship, was censored again by YouTube.8

Oliver Stone’s acclaimed documentary on Ukraine prior to Russian invasion was removed by Youtube.

The Grayzone electronic media outlet was characterised as a ‘pro-Russia’ site and veteran anti-imperialist and celebrated linguist Naom Chomsky was accused of being naive or also biased towards Russia.

To what would be their shame if they were capable of such a saving grace, much of the western Left and liberals, both reformist and revolutionary-claiming sections, rowed in behind the censors and labelled all who didn’t swallow their line, including Chomsky9 as “Putinistas”.

The reporting of the western mass media was accepted uncritically while any alternative reporting was attacked, some being characterised as Russian-backed media (in contrast with the corporate media, which of course is free of bias!).

Challenging journalists have also disappeared in Ukraine, where regime-critical journalist Gonzalo Lira died in Ukrainian jail,10 whereas in Palestine, the Israeli Occupation Force had killed at least 116 journalists as August drew to a close.11

In their acceptance of western censorship, those sections of the Left helped to ideologically prepare the ground for the wide-scale censorship around Palestine about which some of them complain bitterly now.

End.

(Image sourced: Internet)

Footnotes

1https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/telegram-messaging-app-ceo-pavel-durov-arrested-france-tf1-tv-says-2024-08-24/ Update: Durov’s arrest in custody had been extended (see References & Sources).

2https://www.reuters.com/world/us/fbi-searched-homes-two-americans-with-ties-russian-state-media-2024-08-22/

3Medhurst is currently out on bail.

4In a prisoner exchange https://elpais.com/espana/2024-08-01/el-periodista-espanol-pablo-gonzalez-liberado-en-un-intercambio-de-presos-entre-ee-uu-y-rusia.html

5https://www.globaltimes.cn/page/202204/1258996.shtml

6‘The UK media regulator Ofcom has repeatedly found RT to have breached its rules on impartiality and on one occasion found it had broadcast “materially misleading” content.[3][4][5] On 18 March 2022, Ofcom cancelled RT’s UK broadcasting licence “with immediate effect” after concluding the outlet was not “fit and proper” or a “responsible broadcaster”’(Wikipedia). The unconscious irony is staggering.

7https://www.presstv.ir/Detail/2022/03/13/678482/Video-sharing-giants-delete-documentary-Ukrainian-revolution

8Six years of his broadcasts for On Contact and Russia Today were removed from Youtube, prompting him to set up on Substack.

9For many years the darling of the western Left.

10https://www.helsinkitimes.fi/world-int/24744-the-tragic-end-of-gonzalo-lira-a-voice-silenced-in-ukraine.html

11https://cpj.org/2024/08/journalist-casualties-in-the-israel-gaza-conflict

References & Sources

59 news organisations protest ‘Israeli’ slaughter of journalists in Palestine: https://english.almayadeen.net/news/politics/media-groups-urge-eu-to-sanction–israel—suspend-treaty

Thoughtful piece on bias in reporting the Ukraine War: https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2022/8/4/western-media-and-the-war-on-truth-in

Ukrainian state censorship on war reporting: https://theintercept.com/2023/06/22/ukraine-war-journalists-press-credentials/

French authorities’ arrest of Telegram founder: https://www.breakingnews.ie/world/french-police-custody-extended-after-arrest-of-telegram-chief-executive-durov-1665708.html

A Tale of Three Vessels: Submersibles, Yachts and Migrant Boats

On By rebelbreezeIn Current Affairs Comment, Human Rights, Mass Media Criticism, Political AnalysisLeave a comment

Gearóid Ó Loingsigh

(Reading time: 3 mins.)

If one read and believed the international press, one would conclude that the only vessel to sink in the Mediterranean in recent times was the super-yacht, Bayesian, belonging to the magnate Mike Lynch.

The sinking of the yacht was not only international front-page news, but dominated the headlines in the major media outlines since going down on the 19th of August.

From the comments of those who have little to do in life except talk inanely about yachts, it seems to have been an impressive yacht in all senses of the word, and it is surprising that it sank so quickly, as just like the Titanic, it was considered unsinkable and could list up to 75 degrees without capsizing.1

But the super-yacht wasn’t a news item due to its technical characteristics, nor its value, estimated in the region of $40 million dollars, although both aspects were mentioned in the press, but rather for the characteristics and value of those who died (excluding crew of course).

Late tycoon Mike Lynch photographed at home (Source photo: Internet)

Mike Lynch was a software magnate, compared by some media to Bill Gates. He sold his software company Autonomy to Hewlett Packard for eleven billion dollars.2 Without this favourable bank balance his death in the African cemetery that the Mediterranean now is, would go unremarked.

It is not the first time the press went into overdrive on the sinking of a vessel belonging to a rich person.

In June 2023, the submersible Titan imploded near the wreck of the Titanic killing five people, all of them rich and the press dedicated extensive columns to the tragedy for some time, even enquiring about the details of life onboard the Titan.3

On both occasions large-scale and long search and rescue operations were deployed, something the Italian government has tried to criminalise in the case of Africans trying to reach Europe.

In April this year, a court in Sicily acquitted the crew of the Iuventa, who were brought to trial for rescuing migrants (officially for “human trafficking”, i.e. the survivors of a shipwreck).

The crew of the Iuventa rescue ship were on trial for saving lives (Photo sourced: Internet)

The Iuventa boat had by 2017, when Italian authorities impounded it, rescued not less than 14,000 people without favourable bank balances.4 It is not the only attempt to criminalise rescuing shipwrecked people in the Mediterranean. The contrast with Mike Lynch is noteworthy.

Many ships sink each year. The insurance industry reports that between 2013 and 2022, 807 ships with a gross tonnage in excess of 100 tonnes sank around the world, 32 of them in the Mediterranean, almost all of them commercial vessels of different sorts.5

However, according to the IOM, in 2023, 3,041 people died crossing the Mediterranean and 100 alone in the month of January 2024.6 Nobody rescued them, the press did not give over daily columns to their lives. Unlike Mike Lynch, they were not rich.

When the rich die, just like the poor they don’t take their bank balance with them. However, that balance is important.

When the press talk of the value of the person, eleven billion dollars buys words like ‘tragedy, disaster,’ obituaries in major media outlets and it buys a rescue attempt without any fear of those who do the rescuing being charged.

Now that all the survivors and bodies have been rescued, there comes another judicial persecution. The Italian authorities are going to investigate the crew for the accident, but not the deceased Lynch, as if it were possible for the crew to say no to a man with eleven billion in the bank.7

People that rich are all like Donald Trump, they do not take ‘no’ for an answer. Their wish is a command, that must be obeyed. So once again the Italian authorities are going after those who are least to blame for a shipwreck.

A boat carrying over 500 migrant people capsizing off the Libyan coast in 2013 (Photo cred: Italian Navy via AFP)

If they are African migrants, they were asking for it and do not deserve our sympathy or empathy. If they are billionaires, they are victims of the indolence of their employees and we should all mourn them. The world turned upside down.

End.

1 New York Times (22/08/2024) Lynch Yacht Sinking Off Sicily Proves as Baffling as It Is Tragic. Emma Bubola & Michael J. de la Merced. https://www.nytimes.com/2024/08/22/world/europe/sicily-yacht-mike-lynch.html

2 Ibíd.,

3 New York Times (04/07/2023) A Rubik’s Cube, Thick Socks and Giddy Anticipation: The Last Hours of the Titan. John Branch & Christina Goldbaum. https://web.archive.org/web/20240815162607/https://www.nytimes.com/2023/07/02/us/titan-submersible-passengers.html

4 The Guardian (19/04/2024) Crew of migrant rescue boat acquitted in Italy after seven-year ordeal. Lorenzo Tondo. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/apr/19/italian-court-acquits-crew-of-migrant-refugee-rescue-boat-iuventa

5 See https://www.iii.org/fact-statistic/facts-statistics-marine-accidents

6 See https://www.iom.int/news/iom-chief-nearly-100-disappeared-or-dead-mediterranean-2024-underscoring-need-regular-pathways

7 The Guardian (23/087/2024) ‘I’ve never seen a vessel this size go down so quickly’: why did the Bayesian sink in 60 seconds? Lorenzo Tondo.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/article/2024/aug/23/ive-never-seen-a-vessel-this-size-go-down-so-quickly-why-did-the-bayesian-sink-in-60-seconds-mike-lynch

LESSONS THE PALESTINIANS AND THE ISRAELI ZIONISTS HAVE TAUGHT US

On By rebelbreezeIn Anti-War, Current Affairs Comment, Genocide, Imperialism, Internationalist Solidarity, Israeli Zionism, Mass Media Criticism, Massacres, National Liberation, Palestine, peace processes, Political Analysis, US Imperialism, Zionism2 Comments

Diarmuid Breatnach

The past six months of an almost incredible level of Israeli genocide and Palestinian resistance have taught the world some valuable lessons but particularly perhaps to those of us living among the Western powers.

PART ONE: LESSONS FROM THE PALESTINIANS

Diarmuid Breatnach

(Reading time: 11 mins.)

  • Resistance – ongoing, preparation, striking, unity

The Palestinians have taught us the strength and value to an occupied and oppressed people of resistance, from generation to generation, maintaining and developing culture and nurturing historical memory while the occupier tried to erase it all and make the endeavour seem hopeless.

Palestinian woman in Gaza defiant, January 8, 2009 (Photo cred: Eric Gaillard/Reuters)

Without a navy, air force, tanks, armoured vehicles or standard artillery (apart from home-made rockets and missiles), they faced what is often called the “strongest military power in the Middle east”. Despite periodic massacres they have regularly risen against the oppressor.

In truth, it was a lesson that at one time we hardly needed in Ireland, learned even earlier than the Palestinians. But we needed reminding of it.

It is also important for the morale and dignity of the resistance that it shows itself capable of striking at the enemy.

We’ve been reminded of the importance of long-term preparation. The Palestinian resistance built kilometres of tunnels underground in which they also set weapon production factories, developing their own weapons and repurposing existing weapons, including unexploded Israeli Army bombs.

In their Al Aqsa Flood attack on October 7th and fighting since, the Palestinians taught us the value of not only of daring and prior preparation but of coordination and unity, as a number of resistance organisations cooperated in struggle, some secular and some Islamic fundamentalist.1

Palestinian resistance fighters from different organisations displaying their unity in struggle in this photo (Photo sourced: Internet)

In meeting the subsequent genocidal rage of the occupier, the Palestinian resistance have taught us that all the technological might and expertise of the enemy was incapable of crushing a prepared, courageous, united and determined resistance.

The Israeli domination of the air from which it rained down genocidal bombing on civilians and civilian infrastructure, or targeted assassinations of the families of resistance fighters, was not sufficient to defend its ground troops from attack and is itself under attack from GTA missiles.2

The occupier was effective only in genocidal actions against the civilian population and civilian infrastructure for which it will forever be reviled in historical memory. It achieved neither of the objectives it declared as it unleashed its war against Gaza: the wiping out of the resistance and release of captives.

  • Imperialism

We been shown – if we were willing to see it – the unity of western imperialism in supporting the ‘right ‘of a European settler group to establish itself on the land of the indigenous, creating an ethnocentric and theocratic state founded with an act of ‘ethnic cleansing’.3

We have been taught the willingness of the western imperialist states to tolerate the proliferation of acts and policies which it claims go against its fundamental liberal values: oppression, apartheid, discrimination and repression, while lauding the ‘European liberal values’ of the occupier state.

  • Betrayal

Another lesson which we should have learned too within the necessity of unity in a broad front is that it needs to be on a principled basis and the dangers in unity without such safeguards, leading to treachery, betrayal and collusion with the occupier.

The secular left-wing Fatah4 organisation may have seemed at one time the ideal one to follow though some would have favoured the further-left People’s Front for the Liberation of Palestine.5 But it was Fatah, as leading element in the PLO alliance, that signed up to the Oslo accords.6

In return for limited autonomy in a fraction of Palestinian land and without consideration of the right of return to the expelled Palestinians, the Fatah leadership with Yasser Arafat at its head agreed to this “peace process” while its officials scrambled for the gains of official corruption.

Hence the Palestinian Authority, corrupt, unrepresentative, undemocratic and repressive, working in collusion with the occupying authority. Again, our own history should have taught us that lesson but again, it is good to be reminded.

The Palestinians taught us how to deal with such a poisonous fungal growth with the Second Intifada and their last elections, those of 20067 and the carrying through of the electorate’s wishes in 2007, along with the ongoing resistance since.

  • Western Mass Media and alternatives

In reporting the events in Palestine over the decades but in particular over the last six months, we have learned the heavy anti-Palestinian and pro-Israeli bias of the WMM, that accepted without question the transparent lies of the Israeli regime and even questioned the massacre statistics.

Never once has the unjust claim of the occupiers to their stolen gains been questioned, never once the fundamentally just claim of the indigenous even mentioned. The Palestinian resistance has been reduced to one organisation in reporting, to be held up as a bogeyman monster.

(Image sourced: Internet)

If atrocities from across the Palestinian people were reported in the media, they were framed as of dubious provenance, while the most outlandish and illogical claims of the occupier were reported as reasonable fact.

We have, in fact, been taught not to trust the western mass media when reporting on international events and, by extension, not to trust it on domestic issues either. Conversely we have learned to rely more on alternative Internet media but also on the need to navigate those with some caution.

We have also learned that some of the most prominent alternative sources on the war between NATO/Ukraine and Russia, attacked by liberals and sections of the Left as “Russian-controlled” or “Putinistas” turned out to be the most reliable in reporting the realities of the Israeli genocide.

  • Internationalist solidarity

We have relearned the importance of international solidarity, both as we expressed it ourselves and saw its outpouring across the globe. We have been taught the existence of an alternative world of human solidarity in opposition to one based on expropriation, exploitation and competition.

We saw Hizbolah in Jordan and Syria come to the assistance of the Palestinians and pay the price for doing so, as did Ansar Allah (“Houthis”) in Yemen and as has also Iran — what the Electronic Intifada has called “the Axis of Resistance”.

Chilean football team players May 2021 (Photo sourced: Internet)
London, January 2024 (Photo cred: PA)

And we have learned to use internationalism as a measuring stick also in evaluating institutions, political parties and politicians in our own countries. We have seen the meaning of anti-semitism twisted and employed in repression with a stifling censorship across public life – academic, political and social.

Downing Street (containing home of the UK Prime Minister) 29 December 2023 (Photo sourced: Internet)

Political parties and politicians have revealed either their complicity in and collusion with the criminal Israeli genocide or alternatively their inability to resist and effectively oppose it. That has exposed their lack of fitness to lead us in our domestic struggles too.

Teachers and others in Palestine solidarity demonstration in Dublin, March 2024 symbolically carrying infant school chairs in protest against the Palestinian children murdered by the Israeli armed forces. (Photo: D.Breatnach)

IN CONCLUSION

  • The need for revolutionary resistance

The Palestinian resistance has taught us important lessons, including the need of revolutionary resistance in addition to revolutionary organisation and preparation.

It remains to us to learn those hard-earned lessons, to internalise them and to apply them externally. We owe that to the Palestinians and to ourselves.

End.
(Read also Part B – What the Israeli Zionists have taught us follows.)

FOOTNOTES

1Hamas – Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades; Palestinian Islamic Jihad – Al-Quds Brigades; Popular Resistance Committees Al-Nasser Salah ad-Din Brigades; Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine’s Abu Ali Mustafa Brigades; Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine – General Command Jihad Jibril Brigades; Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine (DFLP) – National Resistance Brigades, Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades; Palestinian Mujahideen Movement and its Mujahideen Brigades.

https://www.newsweek.com/not-only-hamas-eight-factions-war-israel-gaza-1841292

2Ground To Air missiles.

3The expulsion of 700,000 Palestinians and massacres such as the one in the village of Dir Yassin.

4Fatah wasfounded in 1957 and was the majority party in the Palestine Liberation Organisation.

5The PLO was founded in 1964 and the PFLP in 1967, next in size of organisation in the PLO to Fatah (Islamic organisations were excluded from the PLO; Hamas recently proposed the reconstruction of the PLO open to all resistance organisations).

6The Oslo Accords were the result of a number of conferences, overseen by the USA and was part of the second of the current“peace processes” which include Ireland, the Basque Country and Colombia.

7Hamas won the elections throughout the accepted Palestinian territories but Fatah tried to continue to keep control, being dislodged from Gaza in 2007 by Hamas, which held back from doing the same thing in the West Bank which has remained under the undemocratic, repressive and colluder control of the Palestine Authority.

SOURCES

https://www.addameer.org/statistics

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Africa_v._Israel_(Genocide_Convention)

https://www.unrwa.org

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

TRUTH AND LIES: REPORT ON SEVEN AID WORKERS KILLED BY ISRAELI STRIKES

On By rebelbreezeIn Current Affairs Comment, Current Event Report, Human Rights, Internationalist Solidarity, Mass Media Criticism, Massacres, Palestine, Political Analysis, Zionism1 Comment

Diarmuid Breatnach

(Reading time: 4 mins.)

Despite how distasteful the task it is nevertheless useful to subject media reports to a truth-and-lies analysis, which what I have done to this Reuters report in Breaking News ie.

Israel’s allies demand answers after airstrike kills aid workers in Gaza.

It is true that 1) the Israeli military killed (seven) aid workers in Gaza and 2) that allies of the zionist state have been obliged to protest strongly.

But the first lie appears in the first sentence of the report: “Israeli prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu confirmed Israel mistakenly killed seven people …” How can it be a ‘mistake’ when THREE VEHICLES ARE EACH HIT, ONE AFTER THE OTHER?

And how can Reuters report “confirmed” as though it were true?

One of the aid agencies’ vehicles showing the missile penetration hole actually through part of the logo and text identifying the agency. (Photo cred: Reuters)

WCK… said its staff were travelling in two armoured cars emblazoned with the charity’s logo and another vehicle, and had coordinated their movements with the Israeli military. Not much chance of accident then, was there?

“Unfortunately, in the past day there was a tragic event in which our forces unintentionally harmed non-combatants in the Gaza Strip,” Mr Netanyahu said in a video statement. Unintentionally? See previous paragraph.

The Israeli military pledged an investigation by “an independent, professional and expert body”. What body could that possibly be? The Israeli government has refused to cooperate with the EU investigation of events on October 7th and instructed medical staff not to talk to them.

In fact Israel does not facilitate external investigations and accuses any organisation that does not agree with the conduct of the state of bias and even of ‘anti-semitism’.

At least 196 humanitarian workers have been killed in Gaza since October, according to the United Nations, and Hamas has previously accused Israel of targeting aid distribution sites. True – but not only Hamas has accused the Israeli state of that but many aid organisations and other states.

So report the list of accusers? Nope!

And they weren’t just “killed” as though by unknown persons – they were all killed by the Israeli military. Reporting commentators have noted that when it’s victims of Israel they are reported as just ‘being killed’ while if killed by Palestinians then it’s ‘Hamas has killed’ etc.

In a call on Tuesday, UK prime minister Rishi Sunak told Mr Netanyahu that UK was appalled by the deaths, which included three Britons, and demanded a thorough and transparent independent investigation, Mr Sunak’s office said.

Again, what body could possibly carry out such an investigation in Israel? If it were truly independent and intending to be “thorough and transparent”, Israel would not cooperate with it. All its own investigations conclude with a ‘not guilty’ or at best ‘inconclusive’ verdict.

The United States, Israel’s closest ally, said there was no evidence Israel deliberately targeted the aid workers but that it was outraged … etc. From any logical assessment, three strikes on three vehicles seems pretty conclusive evidence of “deliberately targeting.”

Israel has long denied accusations that it is hindering the distribution of urgently needed food aid in Gaza, which it has besieged in a war since October, saying the problem is caused by international aid groups’ inability to get it to those in need.

This would seem an appropriate spot to report on the few times the Israeli authorities allow supplies to pass from the long, long line of parked aid lorries outside the Rafah crossing gates, which Israeli protesters are impeding with no action by Israel police or army and. But no mention.

Or the times the Israeli military has opened fire on deliveries or on civilians approaching aid supplies that have gone through, or Israel’s execution of the Chief and Deputy of Gaza Police who organised a recent delivery of flour without food riots or Israeli gunfire. But no mention.

The aid convoy was hit as it was leaving its Deir al-Balah warehouse after unloading more than 100 tons of food aid brought to Gaza by sea, WCK said. So it was clearly identified by logo, by prior announcement to the Israelis and by its departure point.

“This is not only an attack against WCK, this is an attack on humanitarian organisations showing up in the most dire of situations where food is being used as a weapon of war,” WCK’s chief executive Erin Gore said. A rare and very true statement but not by the media.

The US-based charity said it would pause its work in Gaza, and the United Arab Emirates, which has financed the seaborne food deliveries to Gaza that WCK distributed, said it was putting the shipments on hold pending safety guarantees from Israel and a full investigation.

Anera, a US-based aid group that works in part with WCK, said it too was pausing operations in Gaza because of safety concerns.

In other words, another step in the starvation of Gaza achieved by the Israeli state.

The conflict began after Hamas attacks on southern Israel on October 7th that killed 1,200 people, according to Israeli figures. An outright lie which does not become truth no matter how often repeated by the western mass media (which it is in every single report).

The conflict began many decades before October 7th with the zionist settler program which intended and proceeded to carry out a program of ethnic cleansing and, from the moment of the creation of the State in 1948, an expansionist and genocidal program.

Nor was it just Hamas that attacked, nor were all the 1,200 killed by the Palestinians but that is a different discussion.

Conditions in Gaza remain extremely precarious with fighting going on in several areas on Tuesday and 71 people killed in Israeli strikes over the past 24 hours, according to Gaza health authorities.

Yes, the Palestinian resistance continues to resist heroically, with innovation and in principled manner (for example not targeting Israeli Army medical evacuation helicopters) and the Israel military continues to kill civilians, even in hospitals.

But you have to go to other sources to get that kind of information, never in the western mass media.

A final thought: If the victims had been seven Palestinians, would we be even reading about it in the western mass media?

END.

SOURCES:

https://www.breakingnews.ie/israel-hamas/israels-allies-demand-answers-after-airstrike-kills-aid-workers-in-gaza-1608933.html

Also: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/4/3/outrage-grows-over-israels-deadly-attack-on-gaza-aid-convoy

DAILY LIES & PROPAGANDA – PALESTINE

On By rebelbreezeIn Current Affairs Comment, Genocide, Human Rights, Indigenous or Original People, Israeli Zionism, Journalism, Mass Media Criticism, National Liberation, Palestine, peace processes, Political Analysis, Popular Resistance, US ImperialismLeave a comment

Diarmuid Breatnach

(Reading time: 6 mins.)

We, the public have been bombarded daily with lies and propaganda from the western mainstream media (wsm) and nowhere has this been clearer than since October 7th in relation to the Israeli state and the Palestinian people.

It would be useful to unpick some of the most often-repeated items.

For five weeks after the raid, until mid-December the figures given and repeated without question were 1,400 killed1 by Palestinians along with Zionist stories of Israeli babies being beheaded and mutilated and women raped, also repeated without question, challenge or investigation.

The “mutilated and beheaded babies” lie was repeated by US President Biden. That story has now been sunk: ONE Israeli baby died during the attack by hands and means unknown. The rape story has also been debunked and the family of one alleged victim revealed they were manipulated.2

“The Hamas incursion killed 1,200 and took 240 hostages.” This contains at least one lie and another doubtful item. The lie is in the number of Israelis killed by guerrillas and though censored in the wsm this is being widely discussed in the Israeli media, both liberal and right-wing.3

The number of Israelis killed may or may not be not so much in doubt but the issue is who killed them?

Undoubtedly Palestinian guerrillas killed some but, according to Israeli survivors some were also killed in crossfire battles and some deliberately by an Israeli tank firing a shell into a house where guerrillas were holding hostages.

According to some of the Israeli military involved, some were also killed by a commander calling a missile strike on their own position. Israeli helicopter gunships also fired on cars being driven away by guerrillas – almost certainly all those burned-out wrecks — and containing hostages.4

A “graveyard” of burned-out cars, reported post-7th October 2024, all more likely burned by Israeli helicopter Hellfire missiles than by the Palestinian raiders. (Photo sourced: Interneti)

If the number of the Israeli dead has been revised at least twice,5 how can we be sure how many were taken away alive? Of course, this is not such a great issue internationally but will be so for their Israeli relatives and friends who are awaiting and campaigning for their return.6

“The Hamas invasion launched the war on Gaza.” This is inaccurate reporting for propaganda reasons. Certainly the current genocidal bombing of Gaza was begun the next day by Israel but it carried out other bombing campaigns many times in the past and sometimes for months.7

Not only Hamas on October 7th but also Islamic Jihad guerrillas carried out the raid on that date. And some other Palestinians entered when they noted the gaps blown in the walls by the guerrillas.8 Also in resisting the Israeli forces since, there are a number of other Palestinian forces in action.9

In addition, the territory the guerrillas raided is occupied by Israel but belonged to the Palestinians and is claimed by them. How often do we hear or read in the wsm of Israeli forces “invading” areas of the West Bank or Gaza, a district they don’t even officially claim is theirs?

The presentation of news and information in this way is Zionist propaganda aided by the wsm, turning truth on its head to make it seem as though the Palestinians are at fault, the problem is one Palestinian resistance organisation, not necessarily other Palestinians and certainly not the Zionists.

“ … since the Hamas take over of Gaza” is another propaganda twist of the truth, hinting at an illegal and undemocratic coup. The truth is that Hamas won the Palestine Authority elections of 2006 throughout the territory.

The Palestinian organisation formerly in power, Al Fatah, refused to accept the results and later, after a short struggle with Al Fatah, Hamas took their elected places but did not press the issue in the West Bank, where Al Fatah continues to receive funding from the EU and the USA.10

“ … the internationally recognised Palestinian Authority …”11 is clearly another misleading phrase since a) it does not reveal the fact that most Palestinians despise it (which is reported by many observers) and b) that it has not held its scheduled 4-year elections since 2008!

The Second Intifada was a rebellion led by youth against the Oslo Agreement treason of the Al Fatah-led PLO (Photo cred: Abbas Momani)

“Israel claims to have killed 9,000 Hamas fighters but without providing evidence”.12 OK, so they say and it’s fair enough to report it. But shouldn’t an impartial media also report the claims of the guerrillas?

Apart from statements quoting statistics, there have been many videos from the resistance showing them blowing up Israeli tanks and armoured bulldozers by their rockets and with hand-delivered bombs. Claims of Israeli cover-up of casualty figures pop up frequently among commentators.

Also, if Israeli sources are claiming killing 9,000 fighters13 when the overall death toll had passed 25,000, is that not an admission of killing at least 14,000 civilians in three months? Why is the western mass media not making that simple subtraction and publicising its conclusion?

The Gaza health ministry “does not distinguish between military and civilian casualties”14 is quoted in almost every single wsm report listing Palestinian casualties.

The bombardment on our minds by the western mass media. (Cartoon: D.Breatnach)

What is the purpose of this except to allow the reader to infer that maybe most or a heavy proportion of the dead are not civilians? This is nearly always in the report alongside the fact that most of the dead are women and children (therefore without any question civilians.)

A line being repeated in the western mass media more recently is also profoundly misleading: “The Palestinians want a state to include the West Bank, Gaza and parts of Jerusalem.” How does the wsm know what the Palestinians want? Have they carried out a survey?15

In the Oslo Accords, the Al Fatah-dominated PLO agreed to a two-state arrangement, i.e one to be Zionist-run and the other run by Palestinians. The area on offer to the Palestinians composed less than 40% of the original Palestine, much unproductive land and the least accessible water.

However, since 2000, the Second Intifada expressed a clear rejection of Al Fatah which was even more clearly the case with their replacement in the 2008 Palestinian Authority election results. The second-largest organisation in the PLO, the PFLP wants a unitary democratic state.16

The Second Intifada was a rebellion led by youth against the Oslo Agreement treason of the Al Fatah-led PLO (Photo cred: Gallo/ Getty)

All the imperialist states, including the EU, USA and UK, along with the capitalist Arab states support the two-state “solution” (sic) for Palestine which, apart from being fundamentally unjust, is likely to store up trouble for the future — as indeed it has in Ireland.17

End.

FOOTNOTES

1https://www.csis.org/analysis/hamas-october-7-attack-tactics-targets-and-strategy-terrorists

2https://mondoweiss.net/2024/01/family-of-key-case-in-new-york-times-october-7-sexual-violence-report-renounces-story-says-reporters-manipulated-them The immediate purpose of the Palestinian raid was clear: to kill enemy military and take prisoners for exchange for Palestinian prisoners being held in Israeli jails. Quite apart from any question of morals or morale among the guerrillas, the other type of crimes of which they were being accused were clearly impractical in the timescale and would also have given the Zionists and wsm valuable propaganda material against the guerrillas. They clearly did not carry out those crimes but they were accused of them anyway and the lies repeated again and again.

3https://apnews.com/article/israel-hamas-hostages-investigation-friendly-fire-3b6fdd4592957340b32a8ee71505b8e9

4Ibid.

5Anti-Palestinian sources reporting new body count etc https://www.fdd.org/analysis/2023/11/12/israel-revises-october-7-death-toll-after-agonizing-forensics/ and https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20231215-israel-social-security-data-reveals-true-picture-of-oct-7-deaths

6As late as early this month, one believed hostage was confirmed not captured but killed https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-67053011, i.e probably one of those bodies incinerated in a car by Israeli Hellfire missiles from helicopters and only recently identified.

72008-’9 (23 days), 2012 (8 days), 2014 (50 days), 2021 (11 days) https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/8/7/timeline-israels-attacks-on-gaza-since-2005 Israel fought 6 wars with Gaza from 1947 to 1987.

8https://www.timesofisrael.com/nearly-two-months-after-oct-7-for-many-israelis-fate-of-relatives-still-a-mystery/

9Palestinian Front for the Liberation of Palestine, Jenin Brigades, Lion’s Den …

10Yasser Arafat’s Al Fatah party lost the 2008 elections because of their corruption and because of their agreement to the Oslo Accords giving them a kind of state to run through the Palestinian Authority but with no right of return for the Palestinian refugees. The youth rose up in the Second Intifada (2000-2005), against the Israeli occupation but also against Al Fatah misrule and collusion with Zionism. The Al Fatah control of the PA’s offices in the West Bank is in defiance of the 2008 election results but the EU and USA don’t mind sending them the money for the PA.

11Quoted recently from https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/china-calls-gaza-peace-conference-hamas-disclose-fate-israeli-hostages-2024-01-15/

12https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/live-blog/israel-hamas-war-live-updates-rcna132421

13https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/live-blog/israel-hamas-war-live-updates-rcna132421 Highly doubtful and almost certainly an over-estimation by a number of thousands (which would make the number of civilians killed even higher).

14https://apnews.com/article/israel-hamas-war-news-01-25-2024 (paragraph 10)

15Any viable Palestinian state needs to be able to take in the Palestinian refugees, more than 5.6 million registered with the UN in 2019 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palestinian_refugees

16And Hamas stated that they did not invade Israel on October 7th but rather “entered into a part of Palestine”.

17Ireland, like Palestine, was occupied by Britain and ruled as one country. In 1948, with imperialist support, Zionist settlers seized some of Palestine for a ‘Jewish State’ and occupied more of it in 1967. Ireland was partitioned by Britain in 1921, the creation of a sectarian colonial statelet alongside a neocolonial state, which led to a civil war 1922-1923 and a number of guerrilla resistance campaigns since.

SOURCES

Resistance Antidote to Despondency

On By rebelbreezeIn Current Affairs Comment, Guerrilla Action, Indigenous or Original People, Israeli Zionism, Mass Media Criticism, Middle East, National Liberation, Palestine, Political AnalysisLeave a comment

Clive Sulish

Amidst the horror of the daily zionist genocide of Palestinians, actively aided or condoned by the western states, it is easy to feel helpless (although there is always something we can do) and despondent. We offer this from the Electronic Intifada as an antidote.

Thousands March in Palestine Solidarity in Dublin as Gaza Death Toll Becomes Uncountable

On By rebelbreezeIn Current Affairs Comment, Current Event Report, Genocide, Guerrilla Action, Human Rights, Imperialism, Indigenous or Original People, Internationalist Solidarity, Mass Media Criticism, Middle East, National Liberation, Palestine, Political Analysis, Popular Resistance, US Imperialism, ZionismLeave a comment

Diarmuid Breatnach

(Reading time: 4 mins.)

As the death toll of Israeli bombing in Gaza long passes the capacity of imagination and as even the means of counting the dead can no longer be accurate, marchers took to Dublin streets in another Palestine solidarity march.

About 18,000 Palestinians have been killed and 49,500 wounded in Israeli attacks since October 7, including 300 in one 24-hour period.

View of section of the rally shortly after arrival at Molesworth Street. Leinster House, home of the parliament of the Irish State can be seen in the distant background but there were Garda barriers between it and the Palestinian supporters (in addition to the normal high railings). (Photo: D.Breatnach)

Despite the debunking of Biden’s claim of “unreliability” of the Gaza mortality statistics, which have been verified as of a high standard, Israeli bombing has now made his words come true. The ability to collect the numbers and names of the dead no longer exists in Gaza.

Not much left of where to treat the wounded or otherwise sick either with all major hospitals in the area gone and less than half remaining in semi-operation. The hospitals were the place of treatment and of data collection for statistics compilation.1 The Zionist armed forces have bombed them too.2

Another section of rally crowd taken facing away from direction of previous photo, i.e towards the rear. (Photo: D.Breatnach)

First the Israelis bombed people to death and now they have also bombed the mechanisms of collecting and checking the data on how many victims. And they have also not only buried thousands under rubble but also bombed the machinery and equipment for digging them out.3

DUBLIN MARCH

The Dublin march organised by the IPSC rallied outside the north city centre’s Garden of Remembrance and then marched down the city’s main street to cross over via O’Connell Bridge to the south side, then describing a half-circle around Trinity College and up Dawson Street.

Ending in Molesworth Street, the marchers found themselves facing Leinster House, the seat of the parliament of the Irish State but kept well back from it by the special Garda barricades near where the IPSC had their speakers’ platform.

Marchers started to drift off a while after arriving and many missed a performance with two kneeling males blindfolded and stripped to their underpants, with hands seemingly tied behind their backs while a young woman led chants in solidarity with Palestine.

Men in Dublin’s Molesworth Street simulate treatment of Palestinian detainees in Gaza by Israeli Army while women lead solidarity chants. (Photo sourced: Internet)

The blindfolded nearly naked men was clearly a reference to the Israeli army having been photographed recently doing the same to a line of their Palestinian prisoners, on the excuse that they were being interrogated regarding possible Hamas membership.4

Another such video purported to be a mass surrender by Palestinians fighters but was debunked as a number were recognised by others, including relatives: a shopkeeper, a journalist and a UN aid worker, while the few hard sources available indicate the IOF5 is far from gaining surrenders. 6

The very existence of such propaganda testifies to the lack of Israeli military success against fighters, as distinct from ‘success’ against civilians, including women and children, hospitals, public sanitation/ water treatment/ health infrastructure, housing, fishing boats …

A notable feature of the Palestinian solidarity marches in Dublin since October 7th has been the appearance of the Irish language in the written and spoken (or shouted) word. (Photo: D.Breatnach)

Many bystanders along the Dublin march route applauded the marchers and took photos of them. Some joined in the slogans: From the River to the Sea – Palestine will be free! There is only one solution – Intifada revolution! In our thousands, in our millions – we are ALL Palestinians!

Other slogans included: Free, free – Palestine! Saoirse – don Phailistín! Zionist Ambassador – Out, out, out! 1, 2, 3, 4 – Occupation no more! 5, 6, 7, 8 – Israel is a terrorist state! (I personally answer “Israel is a fascist state” which has long been an appropriate description).

IRISH PEOPLE MOSTLY IN SOLIDARITY WITH PALESTINE

Many other towns and cities in Ireland had marches, rallies or pickets on Saturday also. The Palestinian flag flies over Dublin City Hall for a week by vote of elected councillors and at least three city halls elsewhere have been lit up at night with Palestinian colours in solidarity.

With the exception of Loyalist areas in the Six Counties awash with Israeli state flags, the Irish overwhelmingly support the Palestinians.

Section of the crowd at the commencement rally outside the Garden of Remembrance, before the march. (Photo: D.Breatnach)

The Irish population overall is clearly pro-Palestinian which, in the current context, is clearly to be pro-humanity. But although the public position of the Irish Government is among the most supportive in the EU of the Palestinians it is not applying hard pressure against the Israeli state.

The Irish state supports the imperialist/ colonialist two-state ‘solution’ (sic) for Zionists and Palestinians, declines to expel the Israeli Ambassador, to apply sanctions, to progress the Occupied Territories Bill or even to refer Israel to the International Criminal Court.

A number of commentators (including two published on Rebel Breeze) have commented how useless such a referral to the ICC would be, except for its propaganda value perhaps. But the bias demonstrated by an ICC Prosecutor shows the situation to be even worse than was thought.

Palestinians complained that the Prosecutor accepted Israeli refusal to allow visiting Gaza but yet spent days visiting Israeli areas attacked by Hamas and declined a Palestinian offer to visit the hundreds of illegal Israeli settlements, checkpoints and refugee camps in the occupied West Bank.

When Prosecutor Kharim Khan finally held a meeting with Palestinians, he spoke at length, leaving them only ten minutes for their own contributions, to their outrage. Although he later gave them an hour, they fear that he has revealed his deep bias against them.7

A new banner seen on this march in Dublin, it bears the logo of the PFLP, words in Arabic and also calls for freedom for Palestine in Irish. (Photo: D.Breatnach)(Photo: D.Breatnach)

A future government including Sinn Féin may not act very differently; the party supports the 2-State ‘solution’ and was pushing the Government to refer Israel to the ICC. More crucially perhaps will be its close relationship with the USA and its need to work with its future political partners.

The Irish mass media, in line with that of the West, continues to exhibit a deep level of partiality towards Israel, along with hostility towards the Palestinians. The genocidal bombing by Israel is never called that while the short Hamas offensive is called “a rampage”.

The bombing is always presented as a response to the Hamas attack while that attack itself is never portrayed as a response to the many, many Israeli bombings and murders going right back to the expulsion of 750,000 Palestinians in the Nakba coinciding with the 1948 foundation of the state.

The most effective and realistic lever for Palestinian-supportive action remains the ordinary mass of Irish people and it is upon their support that we must rely, along with actions making zionist support as difficult and uncomfortable as possible at all levels in Ireland, especially at the higher ones.

End.

Closeup of section of crowd at rallying point, at commencement of march. (Photo: D.Breatnach)

Footnotes

1One of the Shifa statisticians was killed in the bombing of the hospital and the other three have disappeared since the IOF invaded the hospital https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/how-many-palestinians-have-died-gaza-war-how-will-counting-continue-2023-12-06/

2https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/11/12/how-are-gaza-casualty-updates-affected-by-israeli-attacks-on-hospitals

3And blocked fuel for the machines.

4And the relevance of that to stripping and blindfolding? What else but intimidation and humiliation? An eyewitness also reported having seen a number of Palestinian detainees shot for non-compliance.

5“Israeli Occupation Forces” (instead of IDF)

6https://www.raialyoum.com/israel-isnt-winning/

7See link in Sources.

Sources

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/12/9/analysis-as-israel-escalates-gaza-war-its-kill-rate-claims-dont-add-up

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/liveblog/2023/12/10/israel-hamas-war-live-no-safe-place-in-gaza-as-severe-hunger-spreads

Statistics dead and wounded Palestinians: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/11/12/how-are-gaza-casualty-updates-affected-by-israeli-attacks-on-hospitals

https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/how-many-palestinians-have-died-gaza-war-how-will-counting-continue-2023-12-06/

IOF casualties: https://www.raialyoum.com/israel-isnt-winning/

https://archive.is/2023.12.11-220841/https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/2023-12-10/ty-article/.premium/idf-reports-1-593-wounded-since-october-7-but-hospital-data-is-much-higher/

ICC Prosecutor pro-Israel: https://www.aljazeera.com/features/2023/12/9/alarming-palestinians-accuse-icc-prosecutor-of-bias-after-israel-visit