By David Halpin*

10 July 2007

David Halpin calls on the BBC to honour Alan Johnston by reporting Israeli war crimes, in particular the deliberate shooting and crippling of a Palestinian TV cameraman on 5 July 2007.

Thus is the image of the BBC. It has reporters worldwide and they are usually of high calibre. Listen to “From Our Own Correspondent” to hear good English and sharp observation. Its natural history, Open University programmes and a minority of its documentaries are peerless. But the rub comes with its “news” and current affair programmes. Its motto “Nation Shall Speak Peace Unto Nation” has a very hollow ring when it chooses to interview the discredited “bomber” John Bolton several times about his current target – Iran.

The balance of its coverage in the many months before
“shock and awe” was disgraceful but BBC chutzpah did
not betray it. Media Lens noted the following
in an instructive letter to the then head of BBC News,
Richard Sambrook, dated 1 January 2003: "A BBC News
Online search for 1 January 2002 - 31 December 2002
recorded the following mentions: Noam Chomsky, 5.
Noam Chomsky Iraq, 1. Donald Rumsfeld, 302. Donald
Rumsfeld Iraq, 164. Richard Perle Iraq, 6. Denis Halliday, 0.
George Bush Iraq, 1,022. Tony Blair Iraq, 651.
Tony Benn Iraq, 14. George Galloway Iraq, 42.
Dick Cheney Iraq, 102."

You have noted the Halliday/Bush ratio.

On 31 January 2003, I was on the bridge of a cargo vessel
I had chartered to take ourselves and 50 tonnes of first class
food and other aid to the poorest families in Gaza. I was
being interviewed on camera by a young reporter from
BBC Spotlight South West. The ship was to slip its moorings
the next day. I explained that I was doing it to focus attention
unresolved conflict (dreadful euphemism for genocide, in fact) and to demonstrate our common humanity. I went on to say that the second purpose was to stand for peace and reason against the unreason and destructiveness of the looming war on Iraq.

“Stop the recording. We cannot include that, Mr Halpin. There is no balancing comment,” the reporter said.

I replied that we had suffered wall to wall warmongers like Perle, Edelman, Wolfowitz and their like on the BBC for months. My voice would move the balance by a fraction in the opposite direction.

The camera rolled, the same words were said, and again the interview was stopped. The interview was only allowed to proceed with the future incineration of Iraqi children excluded. The ITN interviews, on the other hand, included this second reason for the voyage of the Dove and the Dolphin. It was obvious that the BBC reporter had been given his battle orders.

The kindly Alan Johnston, the BBC's Gaza correspondent,
was kidnapped on 12 March 2007. That caused widespread
alarm, although the risks were known. It later emerged that
he was being held by the Army of Islam. I am told that this clan
“army” had been allied early on with Hamas until it was
enticed into the grouping favoured by Israel and the West.
Demands were made later for the release of certain Muslim
leaders that had featured strongly in Western propaganda.
It seemed likely that the purpose of his incarceration was to
add to the chaos and thus to the instability designed to unseat
Hamas, although many thousands of assault rifles, other
weapons and ammunition were the main ingredient.
The BBC, journalists worldwide and his many friends
demonstrated for his humane treatment and prompt release.
I echoed this in March before cameras and microphones on
behalf of the seven doctors whom I led; we had just spent
a useful 30 minutes with a gracious and thoughtful Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh.

All the Palestinians we met were upset for Alan. And then came his joyful and noisy release on the 4th of this month. Now he feels the Scottish winds on his scalp, having swapped the din and heat of Gaza for the greens of Argyll.

In the early hours of Thursday 5 July, an Israeli special forces unit penetrated about 1 km from the eastern border of the Gaza Strip towards the Al-Bureij refugee camp – refugees from the nakba, the catastrophe of spring 1948. Hamas resistance fighters responded and a gun battle ensured. The Israeli occupation forces called in tanks and aircraft. A cameraman who was filming for the Al-Aqsa channel was shot and fell. Further shots were fired as he lay. A Palestinian Red Crescent ambulance was destroyed. That cameraman has since had both legs amputated and resides in the intensive care unit of the Al-Shifa hospital with the many others injured by the most modern weaponry.

Although I have no power as a UK citizen and BBC licence payer, I emailed the BBC News website, the BBC’s Middle East editor, Jeremy Bowen, and two other BBC correspondents in the area. I quoted these links [link-1 and link-2] and said: “The BBC should report the alleged details about the shooting and the ambulance and crew. It should honour Alan as a journalist by reporting the facts, uncomfortable as they might be to Israel. For truth, David.”

I know of no such report from the BBC but a report by the
International Herald Tribune is detailed. It reports that the
International Federation of Journalists, in a statement from
Brussels, Belgium, denounced Israel for what it said was
"a vicious and brutal example of deliberate targeting of
a journalist".

A Reuters video entitled “Shot while filming a gun battle”
shows a supine man with the microphone sticking up from
the camera by his shoulder while more bullets pluck at his
body. It advised viewer discretion and stated the facts: a
Palestinian camerman is hit by a volley of bullets while
filming clashes between Israeli occupation soldiers and
Palestinian resistance fighters in Gaza.

Having seen the video and read the written evidence, listen to
Major Avital Leibowitz saying: “He was a legitimate target, you
can't wait to see whether he pulls out a gun or not.” It has to be said that he was not wearing a distinctive jacket but then James Miller and Tom Hurndall were wearing very distinctive jackets before they were gunned down by the Israeli troops.

We ask the BBC again to honour Alan Johnston by reporting the several likely war crimes committed this last Thursday [5 July] and to press for an international investigation of them. Could not “embedded” journalists in the Green Zone be treated as members of a militant group using Liebowitz's rules.

I am told by one of many trusted friends in Gaza that Imad Ghanem, this now legless cameraman, often led the demonstrations of journalists clamouring for Alan's release.