Syria and chemical weapons - the clear media 'chain of custody'

Located, collated and verified by Media Lens: damning evidence of media-deployed Chemical Weapons Propaganda (CWP).

And, from Fair, more blatant CWP and crossing of journalistic 'red lines'.

Read, be informed and, as the political calls for 'benign Western intervention' in Syria grow, remember and reference these fine exposures of our service media once again beating the spurious drums for war.

Israel bombs Syria - an act of war and another 'red line' crossed

Israel has just committed at least two significant acts of war in bombing Syria. Many people are, most likely, dead and injured as a result. Yet, the BBC has nothing to report about the true status of the aggression and little about the human cost. 

Consider if this had been a violation of Israeli airspace, an actual bombing of Israel or any such attack on a Western country. Imagine the 'international crisis'. The context would have been immediate and specific: 'an act of war', the coverage of victims massive and detailed.  

Nor are Israeli 'strikes', rather than bombings, reported by the BBC as specifically inhuman or illegal. They're described, rather, with a basic insouciance, as though 'terror states' and their people should routinely expect such treatment.

The BBC's Jonathan Marcus amplifies the view that such 'strikes' are not criminal acts of war but legitimate messages to Assad:

"Back in January of this year, Israel struck a weapons convoy that intelligence sources suggest was carrying SA-17 advanced surface-to-air missiles that were to be transferred from Syria to Lebanese militant group Hezbollah. That strike was a warning, an effort to dissuade the regime of President Bashar al-Assad from contemplating any similar transfers to his allies in Lebanon. These latest strikes suggest that this hoped-for deterrent effect has not been achieved."  

And so, for Marcus, the 'deterrent' effort goes on:

"While President Barack Obama may be hesitant in acting to implement his "red-line" warning to Damascus over the potential use of chemical weapons, Israel is determined to enforce its own "red-line" relating to the transfer of sophisticated weaponry to Hezbollah."

When a sovereign state deemed 'official enemy' by the West is bombed, the language is respectfully muted and sanitised, as in the BBC's main online report of the Damascus attack:

"The BBC's Yolande Knell in Jerusalem says the latest developments are a significant escalation in Israel's involvement in the conflict."

Note the crucial descriptor: "significant escalation". Again, not 'an act of war'. And certainly not 'a war crimes atrocity'.

Knell's rationale is, likewise, a straight reiteration of the 'defensive, pre-emptive response':

"She says Israel has already responded to fears of retaliation by locating two batteries of its Iron Dome missile defence system near Haifa, close to the Lebanese border."

Knell doesn't even include the most basic journalistic disclaimer, as in 'Israel says/claims that it has already responded to fears of retaliation', just an unquestioned acceptance and repetition of Israeli statements.

On the same page, BBC correspondent Jim Muir uses similar restrained and loaded terminology to avoid any 'act of war' interpretation:

"Two air strikes in 48 hours does indeed start to look perilously like the involvement in Syria's internal crisis the Israelis have always said they want to avoid, especially when they are visibly taking out military targets on the very edge of Damascus.

Once more, note the qualified words: "perilously like the involvement" that Israel "want[s] to avoid".

The intimation is vitally important: Israel has been 'forced', 'reluctantly', 'dutifully', in 'vigilant self-defence', to 'intervene'.

Consider the alternative and much more likely possibility, faithfully circumvented by the BBC.

Israel, seeing the significant advances of Assad's government forces, have bombed Damascus in order to give logistical support and sustenance to rebel and other Western/Saudi-backed forces.

But, why would Israel assist jihadi-driven forces? 

Muir's one-dimensional analysis is, similarly, conditioned by the accepted 'Israel-fears' line: 

"Objectively it would be hard to see Israel's interest in helping trigger an uncontrolled collapse of the regime, leaving the field open to rebel groups among which Islamist radicals currently make the running."

What Muir, like many other 'seasoned analysts', fails to discuss is Israel's key war-promoting part in the ultimate removal of Assad, the now zero-sum agenda to effect regime-change and dislocation of the Syria-Iran-Hezbollah nexus. 

Even if an Islamic-infused entity does comes to replace Assad, it will likely act, as with Libya, through the pacified understanding of Western/Saudi patronage, all border-policed by Nato-membered Turkey, a Western-colonised Iraq and, of course, nuclear-laden Israel.

Where is the most elementary exploration of these dark Western/Israeli manoeuvrings in such BBC 'analysis'? 

If the goal of calculated regime change is not seemingly deserving of considered discussion by the BBC, nor is it remotely ready to apportion the same 'red line' labels applied to Assad now the UN has credible evidence pointing to the use of sarin by rebel forces.  

Like the suppression of Israel's latest 'acts of war', the BBC and other Western-service media are unlikely to see even strong prima facie proof of rebel-deployed chemical weapons as a 'game changer' in Syria's civil war.

Nor might it contemplate similar Israel-excusing language were Syria to bomb Tel Aviv in response, or for any other state to bomb Israel for crossing chemical weapons 'red lines', such as attacking Gaza with white phosphorus.

In the same selective vein, illumination of Israel's own 'false-flag' involvement in chemical weapon use inside Syria remains prudently under-examined by a media repeating the dominant narrative of Israel's 'defensive actions'.

How many crossed 'red lines', illegal actions and indications of 'game-changing' subterfuge must it take for Israel to be denounced and described as a criminal, warmongering state?   

Malaysian general election - in pursuit of the better society

Finally, a landmark election moment for courageous, resilient Malaysians who now see before them not only the possible prized deliverance from a venal, repressive government, but the political and social cleansing of their country.

Whatever the outcome, I hope your vote counts towards the emergence of something new and remarkable, something historic, something your children will remember you for in seeking to cast out not just a decaying party, a motley coalition, but an entire system of money politics and institutional corruption.

Predictably, every last resource, every dark trick, from electoral fraud and media bias to outright violence and intimidation, has been wielded to protect and preserve the ruling network.

All of which illustrates the seismic challenge of not only overcoming those determined forces, but in looking hopefully beyond them.  

Serious change involves much more than winning majorities and taking over political offices. That may be a vital, momentous step.

The longer, harder task lies in constructing a progressive and radical alternative, one that doesn't depend on the weight of component parties, the placating of sectoral interests or even the voices of charismatic leaders.

Crucially, it must also find ways of resisting the blackmail demands of neoliberal forces and the tempting incorporations of external state powers.

In short, it requires an entirely new and expansive mindset, energised by the fundamental needs of people: putting human beings before big business, social need before corporate greed, public health before private wealth, sustainable life before eco-destruction.   

In that optimistic vein, a small dedication to all those at Aliran and tireless Malaysian activists like Anil Netto who have worked and campaigned so relentlessly for decades not only in pursuit of electoral change and a just constitution, but for every aspect of the truly better society.

That humanitarian spirit will, hopefully, continue to be the guiding, moral force that, whatever the parliamentary numbers, keeps conscientious Malaysians striving towards the highest prize of all: a participatory politics built on real economic compassion and social justice.     

Real journalism and BBC royal make-believe

A basic element of serious, inquisitive journalism is its readiness to expose official lies and liberal posturing. The thought came to mind on reading two fine examples of the art.

The first is John Pilger's searing account of Aboriginal persecution, past and present, as shown by the brutal incarceration of indigenous people in Western Australia; historic and current crimes glossed-over by 'commercial development' and tourist-promoting spin.

The second is Glenn Greenwald's admirable defence of whistleblower extraordinaire Bradley Manning and the disgraceful capitulation of San Francisco Gay Pride in refusing to honour him, all in compliance with Obama-image politics, US militarism and corporate imperatives.

Both articles shine critical lights not just on specific injustices, but on larger issues of power, control and incorporated thinking.  

They also got me wondering how some BBC reporters might really feel when they see this kind of exemplary journalism: embarrassed, threatened or, perhaps, even quietly admiring?

How, for example, might the BBC's royal correspondent Nicholas Witchell view Pilger, Greenwald and the kind of journalism that actually exposes and indicts, rather than glorifies and protects.

 

Have a look at this latest BBC film report from Witchell on the 'young royals' and ask the question: real journalism or elite PR service?  

One might think it inappropriate, even bizarre, to compare and contrast the likes of Pilger and Witchell. There's a weird-seeming bathos in even citing their names and output in the same discussion.

Yet, consider how so much Pilger-type, truth-bearing journalism - on warmongering, invasions, human rights violations, suppression of information, climate change and other crucial public interest issues - is routinely shunned, while this kind of populist propaganda is accorded expansive airtime on the Six O'Clock News.

I recall a 2010 sighting of Witchell at Glasgow Central Station as he delivered a report on Prince Charles, who had just arrived on a private royal train to head-up a 'sustainable living' promotion.

It was strange to see them both in the flesh, Mr Windsor, owner of Cornwall and much else, looking all eco-earnest as he was guided around by bowing lackeys, Witchell all sycophantically enthused as, on cue, he trotted-out cringing lines about 'green-caring' royalty.

More surprising was my actual thoughts on observing Witchell, which weren't straight feelings of hostility, but of quiet incredulity, even a certain sadness, that someone could have prostituted themselves so eagerly in the name of career 'journalism'. (Nicholas Witchell, if you ever happen across this blog, I'd be greatly interested to read your own thoughts on these matters.)

The whole scene was a perfect encapsulation of establishment posturing, royal branding and issue-cloaked reporting.

Watching Witchell's grovelling piece later, there was, predictably, no content or commentary on the real problem of corporate-driven climate catastrophe, or any suggestion of this being a 'green-washed' event. The idea of having such balancing opinions from the BBC on this or the legitimising function of such royal PR was, apparently, unthinkable.  

This is the liberal prism through which we're encouraged to approve the 'public-serving virtues' of 'our royals' and a media which rationalises their privileged existence. From jubilees and weddings to pregnancy updates and charity visits, blanket royal coverage provides a double establishment facade: one to popularise the monarchy, the other to reaffirm the role of state-service journalism.

It's a template royal reportage that even extends to other countries, as in the BBC's voluminous coverage of Queen Beatrix's abdication and successor in the Netherlands, an event of little general interest made 'notable' news for the public.  

Royal reporting fits closely with other BBC news output in authenticating the dominant system and, like the monarchy, any component of it that might be questioned as class-ridden, archaic and undemocratic. Indeed, that protective role is even more effective with royal reporting, situated somewhere akin to 'info-tainment', thereby helping to disguise its true political and power-supporting function.  
 
While such reports might be defended by the BBC as just additional 'feel-good' news items, the anachronism of 'court correspondence' and daily observance of royal minutiae helps feed a significant cultural message of subservience, passivity and deference. 

In that vein, here's Witchell's sickly summation of William, Kate and Harry visiting the Warner film studios:

"This is the make-believe world of Harry Potter. In the real world, though, there is no doubt that these three are becoming the principal supporting stars in the enduring family epic that is the Windsors. The British monarchy has shown what a powerful spell it's capable of casting. And, in these three, few can doubt that that spell remains in powerful hands..."

It's a powerful illusion, for sure. But, there's little doubt either about the make-believe world crafted by Witchell and the BBC in helping to cast a feudal, privileged institution as something modern and democratic.  In similar 'spellbinding' ways does the BBC seek to present itself as something alluringly benign. In that dual fairy tale, the ideological 'wands' remain in enduringly powerful hands.

All of which subject-gazing leaves diminishing space and opportunity for viewing real news subjects, the news that matters, excluding, for certain, the kind of searching, humanitarian journalism noted above, an invigorating journalism still rarely permitted in the liberal media, though to be found, more hopefully, through an emerging alternative media.

One wonders whether Nicholas Witchell and his make-believe peers ever venture to that real world for illumination of the news, issues and truths they themselves are unlikely ever to convey.

Ilan Ziv's Exile, a Myth Unearthed - uncovering BBC bias

Intriguing details are emerging of craven censorship at the BBC after an apparently well-regarded documentary by Israeli filmmaker Ilan Ziv was pulled by senior figures citing spurious excuses about editing, scheduling and other internal 'concerns'.

The central premise of Ilan Ziv's film, Exile, a Myth Unearthed, concerns the historical falsity of claims that Jews were expelled from their homeland in 70AD. An abridged version of the film was due to be shown on BBC4 under the (sanitised) title Jerusalem: An Archeological Mystery Story.

Following a flow of complaints to the BBC over its cancellation, Ziv has written a deeply-revealing account of why his film has now been discarded and the shameful subterfuge of BBC executives in coming to that decision.

Ziv's piece The exiling of my film is in itself a valuable unearthing of deep-rooted bias, fear and panic within the BBC. It also shows the extent of Zionist anxiety over the public showing of such scholarly and honest work.

The excellent independent journalist Jonathan Cook has posted these responses (at his facebook page) to Ziv's revelations:

A few days ago I reported on the BBC's apparent caving in to Zionist pressure to ditch at the last moment a documentary called Jerusalem: An Archeological Mystery Story. I speculated that this was an act of political censorship in line with other recent craven positions on Israel and the Palestinians adopted by BBC executives. Now we have the film director's input to help assess what happened.

First some background: the film uses archeological evidence to propose that the Zionist claim that the Jews were exiled from their homeland in AD70 is nothing more than a myth. This is a view now widely accepted by scholars, but is deeply opposed by Israel's supporters because:

a) it suggests the Zionist claim that Jews are "returning" to the Promised Land is bogus - the truth is they never left.

b) it also suggests that today's Palestinians are in fact descended from those Jews who remained (converting later to Christianity and Islam), while most of the Jews "returning" are descended from Jewish converts who never lived in the region.

One can see why Israel's supporters would not want a film like this airing on the BBC, even on the less-watched channel BBC4.

Ilan Ziv, the film's director, now gives his side of the story and, even given his diplomatic language, it's clear this was an act of clear-cut censorship.

In short, Ziv explains: The BBC editors who bought the rights from the Canadian producers clearly liked the film. But they also appear to have realised it would cause all sorts of problems with their higher-ups. So they gave the film a new name that concealed its true subject matter, heavily cut it, intended to take Ziv's name off the credits, and failed to inform Ziv about the cuts or even that it was due to be shown until the very last moment - apparently in the hope that they could steamroller through the watered-down version.

Ziv: "So back in November 2012, everything seemed to be on track to produce a cut down of the film without having to deal with the director, broadcast the film under a neutral title and hopefully avoid any serious political debate. A perfect solution!"

But things got complicated. Ziv found out about the showing and protested to the BBC. Then he discovered that the show's editors had panicked when one of the freelance staff they brought in thought even the neutered version was "propaganda". An internal review also found a scene showing Palestinians "too emotive". Ziv, realising the deal was about to fall through, offered to produce a defence for his documentary.

Ziv: "I told them that some of the academic participants in the program who saw the cut and are reputable scholars in their field did not find any factual errors or misrepresentations of facts or of the historical narrative. In other words, I argued that such a detailed and substantial defense would convince any objective reader and observer of the editorial integrity of the film. I repeated the request several times yet I never got a reply."

Instead the BBC pulled it from the schedules and are now saying they have no intention to show it.

Ziv: "I hope that somewhere in the BBC someone will rise above the hysteria and the attempts at self censorship to take a cooler look at the film and realize how it has been profoundly mis-characterized."

Nice that Ziv takes such a charitable view of the BBC, but the problem is not that the film's subject matter has been mischaracterised; it's that the BBC executives, or the lobby groups that have their ear, have understood the film's importance only too well.

Nonetheless, kudos to Ziv for going public. That takes some courage in a business where you have to rely on commissions. And kudos too for his pledge to show the film as widely as he can in the UK, in spite of the BBC.

(h/t Media Lens MB)

One can only trust that the BBC's prevarications and continuing web of deceit will now guarantee Ilan Ziv's film even better distribution and public illumination.

 

Between his film and exposure of the mendacious efforts to hide it, Ziv may have helped advance the unravelling of two enduring myths, one purporting Zionist 'ancestry', the other proclaiming BBC 'impartiality'.

Universal empathy - from Kabul to Boston

What feelings of empathy might we express for the victims of terrorism, all terrorism?

I heard someone remark after the Boston Marathon killings that seeing the actual names, photos and personal details of the victims 'makes all the difference' to how we react.

It was an honest and compassionately-felt view, yet one that, unwittingly, suggests much more about a wider lack of universal empathy.

It seems universally evident that the personalisation of any life taken in such horrific ways can invoke in almost anyone a natural sense of identification, sympathy and regard. Most often, that empathy reflects basic feelings of caring familiarity as we ask what it would be like if the victims were our own family or friends.

But what of all those victims whose names are never stated, their personal details never noted, their memories never recorded? What of those victims with little geographic and cultural proximity to 'us'? How much of that 'universal' concern and empathy is so readily dispensed?

More particularly, to what extent is that capacity for universal compassion conditioned by state officialdom, politicians and the media?

Barack Obama has been lauded for vowing to bring those allegedly responsible for the Boston killings to justice. Yet, alongside his continuation of US killing in Afghanistan, he is now directly responsible for more civilian drone deaths than any other president.

Remarkably, that's not news in itself. More remarkable is the accepted mode of information that keeps us from ever asking why it's not news.

Obama and much of the Western media have been consciously calling the Boston bombing not just an act of 'terror' but of specific 'terrorism', with all the key implications that carries. In contrast, the mass murder of civilians in US-waged wars around the globe carries no such descriptions. Unlike Boston, these victims are not only anonymous, but deserving of little or no empathy.

While a dutiful and fascinated media gazed over every conceivable aspect of the Boston deaths, from victim background to 'why America?' punditry, car bombings in Iraq, claiming the lives of 55 people, received rudimentary coverage from the BBC and other leading media.

In token fashion, Fox News used Boston as a "reminder of violence elsewhere", briefly noting the Iraq and other world terror killings as some kind of common, but distant concern:   

"because attacks like this usually happen in far-off, troubled places — not in the middle of a major American city."

Little wonder that viewers are not only disinterested in 'that kind of terror', but much more likely to excuse or ignore 'our' responsibility for mass killing in those "far-off, troubled places".

Thus, for example, a Western public will readily accept, if they ever get to notice, the bombing of civilians at an Afghan wedding party as a 'regrettable error' rather than 'state terror'.

Glenn Greenwald laments the prevalence of such selective compassion:

"The widespread compassion for yesterday's [Boston] victims and the intense anger over the attacks was obviously authentic and thus good to witness. But it was really hard not to find oneself wishing that just a fraction of that compassion and anger be devoted to attacks that the US perpetrates rather than suffers."

As Greenwald asserts, it's understandable for people to show greater and more immediate concern for the loss or suffering of those nearest to them. Yet:

"whatever rage you're feeling toward the perpetrator of this Boston attack, that's the rage in sustained form that people across the world feel toward the US for killing innocent people in their countries. Whatever sadness you feel for yesterday's victims, the same level of sadness is warranted for the innocent people whose lives are ended by American bombs. However profound a loss you recognize the parents and family members of these victims to have suffered, that's the same loss experienced by victims of US violence. It's natural that it won't be felt as intensely when the victims are far away and mostly invisible, but applying these reactions to those acts of US aggression would go a long way toward better understanding what they are and the outcomes they generate."

The psychological disincentive to showing universal empathy is closely bound with dominant messages encouraging loyal identification with 'ours' - as in the selective news coverage and mourning of lost soldiers, rather than lost civilians, in Afghanistan.

Anyone who dares extend that empathy to the suffering 'other', particularly after terror attacks on the West, can be maligned as 'provocative', 'disrespectful' or, in the heat of 'under-attack' America, a 'fellow-supporter of terrorism'.

British boxer Amir Khan was denounced for asking people to "spare a thought" for the victims of terror attacks in places like Pakistan, Afghanistan and Palestine in addition to those killed in Boston.

Why was this fair and compassionate appeal described as "controversial"? And what does it say about a media which so readily frames criticism in this way?

Similar condemnation was directed at Independent writer Owen Jones for daring to tweet:

“Thoughts with the people of Iraq, too. At least 31 dead in yet another day of bombs. Horrific.”

This had followed his initial tweet:

“Horrified by the scenes in Boston. The killing of innocent civilians is an affront to all our humanity. Solidarity and thoughts with Boston.”

Combined, both messages amount to a universal, humanitarian statement. Yet, those who venture such added compassion and speak about the "hierarchy of suffering" are immediately damned for making a 'political' point.

That censorious reaction makes it all the easier to promote an establishment-serving mood of populist retribution. The fervoured hunting-down and arrest of Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, wall-to-wall-media coverage, open celebration of his capture and ritualised "USA, USA" chants all fuel more reactionary patriotism, fear, repression and compliance.

As Greenwald suggests regarding the political efforts to curtail Tsarnaev's Miranda rights:

"Needless to say, Tsarnaev is probably the single most hated figure in America now. As a result [...] not many people will care what is done to him, just like few people care what happens to the accused terrorists at Guantanamo, or Bagram, or in Yemen and Pakistan. But that's always how rights are abridged: by targeting the most marginalized group or most hated individual in the first instance, based on the expectation that nobody will object because of how marginalized or hated they are. Once those rights violations are acquiesced to in the first instance, then they become institutionalized forever, and there is no basis for objecting once they are applied to others[...]"

Dzhokhar Tsarnaev has now reportedly stated from his hospital bed that he was motivated to plant the bombs in response to the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan.

Whatever the brothers' own brutal crimes, it's, as Alex Thomson bravely asserts, a damning 'reap what you sow' indictment of Western warmongering, and ongoing politicisation of young, disaffected men which the US and its allies will, as ever, do their best to hide or ignore.  

With no apparent evidence of al-Qaeda guidance or any religious-jihadi hand, US authorities can only repeat that the brothers were 'self-radicalised'. Yet, what does that term usefully tell us? 

The word 'radicalised' here is used as a pejorative charge, equating a person's considered opposition to illegal invasions and inhuman killing as somehow dangerous, subversive and threatening. Yet, if opposing state terrorism is to be 'radicalised', whether through others or self-realisation, there must be many millions of 'radicals' out there - even if the vast majority, including devout Muslims, don't resort to exploding bombs to make their 'radical' point.

The indictment against Dzhokhar Tsarnaev includes the particular charge of using weapons of mass destruction. Yet, lethal as the improvised pressure cooker bombs were, are we to believe that these makeshift devices can be equated with actual WMD held and wielded by states like the US and Israel? The inclusion of WMD on the charge sheet seems intended to both maximise public fear and enhance the Federal prosecutor's case for a death penalty.     

Besides the still many unexplained circumstances behind the bombing, killing of Tamerlan Tsarnaev and apprehending of Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, key questions and issues of disinformation remain over the relationship between Tamerlan Tsarnaev and US intelligence.

While patriotic citizens cheered the 'fine work' of the police, FBI and CIA, little did they know that the US authorities already had the elder brother 'in their sights'.  Why, many now ask, wasn't he properly monitored or detained, and why did the FBI and Russian FSB intelligence permit him free and unquestioned movement between the US and Chechnya/Dagestan? 

As with the latest Canadian claims of an 'al-Qaeda-Iranian bomb plot', much of what an approving public is being told, and repeated by the media, about 'close surveillance' and 'terror alerts' ranges from the spurious to the "hilarious".   

More familiar questions are being asked about how 'assimilated' citizens like the Tsarnaev brothers could bring themselves to reject 'American values' in this way. How could those, even of foreign background, raised in America come to embrace such 'radicalised' hatred of their 'adopted' home? Perplexed observers also wonder how their consumerist lifestyles and aspirations can be squared with their brooding ideological discontent.     

Again, the very framing of these questions suggests an insularity of thought, a negation of universal empathy and the feelings of those victimised and aggrieved by US/Western actions. For, why, beyond the political/media hype, would anyone living in the US not be able to see America's crimes and feel an urge to harbour such resentment?

Other 'clues' to a motive suggest the alienation Tamerlan Tsarnaev supposedly felt in never having made an American friend, as though this was a sign of social deviancy and terrorist intent. 

It's likely that he did shun or see little worth in such associations. But what does that 'isolation' really indicate other than the remoteness and antagonism many people from ethnic groups feel towards their 'host' country, particularly one engaged in murderous wars against those of the same religious and cultural belonging?

In a country where anti-Muslim feeling runs so perniciously deep, many Muslims do, indeed, live lives of precarious detachment and marginalisation. But it doesn't make them more likely than any other US citizen, Christian, Muslim or otherwise, to kill and slaughter.      

A more fitting question here might be: does the social experience of the powerful explain or legitimate their willingness and ability to take the lives of others? As one apposite tweet put it:

"What is the heinous motive of Barack Obama, who was born here and grew up here, to murder so many innocent civilians over the last five years?"

If the Tsarnaev brothers did carry their 'self-radicalised' beliefs into acts of unwarranted violence, what relative labels might we apply to Obama and those operating at the much higher level of terror? How about 'power-radicalised', 'devoutly-militarised' and 'socially-dehumanised'?

Even if all wanton killing is to be universally condemned, the actions of state terrorists still carry more weight, responsibility and criminality than the individual crimes inflicted by those in situations like Boston.  Of course, it's a measure of the power ideology noted that this differentiation would also be routinely denounced as 'radical' and 'indecent'.

In rejecting such righteous denunciation, universal empathy means transcending the conformist-serving propaganda that seeks to contain and prevent our capacity for true, all-compassionate awareness, a meaningful concern that extends sincerely and actively to all victims, all human beings, from Kabul to Boston and beyond.

Israel: Facing the Future - with added BBC stuffing

I read somewhere that competing pizza producers in America have been trying to figure out ways of getting even more fat-filling additives into their products by packing full even the inner crusts.

The stomach-bloating image came oddly to mind while watching John Ware's film Israel: Facing the Future.

From the introductory line that "Israel's once-peaceful southern border has turned hot", almost every part of Ware's product is stuffed through with fattening fabrications and indulgent cliches about 'necessary security', the 'Arab threat', the 'jihadist/Hamas menace', the 'separation barrier' (rather than the Wall) the 'intractable conflict' and the 'two-sided problem', with each side weighed down by a heavy 'mutual distrust'. 

If the 'new pizza topping' is convivial chats with young, life-loving Israelis and the ruminations of concerned elders on the country's social strains, militarist existence and internal religious divisions, the 'crusty filler' is the message that, despite the obvious discrimination on view, Palestinian Arabs in Israel are still broadly 'accepted' and can enjoy the 'freedoms' of being part of the 'only democracy in the Middle East'. 

For all its 'enticing taste' of a complex Israeli society, the real food for thought in Ware's report is notably absent from the table. There's no actual mention of the Nakba, no discussion of the ethnic cleansing and mass displacement of 1948, of Resolution 194 and the Palestinian Right of Return. The actual word 'occupation' may have been used, once, in the film, but there's no actual reference to 'The Occupation' proper.

There's no reference either to the long and brutal siege of Gaza, merely a passing aside on the recent assaults against its desperate people, along with the familiar refrain that Israeli settlers had 'willingly' left there in 2005 and the usual lines about Gazans wasting this 'kindly-given opportunity' in letting Hamas turn the territory into a 'jihadist launch-pad'. 

The only other 'crust-end' on Gaza is young off-duty conscripts relating how many Facebook 'likes' some Israeli sites get from there.

Ware might have ventured to ask how many Gazans 'liked' IDF soldiers smearing excrement on the walls of their homes during their 'Cast Lead' invasion or whether they felt any guilt over their daily killing of Palestinians, the 'administrative detention' of Palestinian children or the spraying of raw sewage on Palestinian homes across the West Bank. But that wouldn't have been to the BBC's liking.

Out on training operations with the IDF, Ware indulges their concerns about a 'once-again, all-alone' Israel and its survivalist fears of surrounding foes: "Syria is in flames with the risk of chemical weapons falling into Hezbollah's hands", the 'Islamist threat' is on the rise in Jordan, Egypt, and, of course, in "Gaza, now run by Hamas, backed by Iran, whose president has threatened to wipe Israel off the map and may soon be nuclear-armed." It's amazing, indeed, what can be stuffed into one fearmongering sentence. 

Beyond these tired distortions, Ware can't seemingly spare a moment to note the whole new dynamic of Hamas's difficult relations and estrangement with Tehran and its new engagement of Egypt and the Gulf states. Perhaps he doesn't even know about such things. What difference, so long as the 'media-baked pizza' has all the popularly-recognised ingredients.

In considering "Bibi" Netanyahu's popularity, Ware talks of Israel's difficulties over the "conflict with its Palestinian Arab neighbours", a term which, rather than 'occupied people', infers some kind of suburban hedge dispute.

Mingling at a football match with Likud-supporting Beitar Jerusalem fans, he asks how peace might be achieved with those "Palestinian neighbours", language, again, serving to pacify the relationship and the 'problematic' process of 'getting them to agree'.

Some of the Beitar fans express misgivings on the bigotry shown by a section of their support over the signing of two Muslim players, further suggesting a certain tolerance for Arabs and the notion that intolerance is still rather marginal. Never in any of these encounters does Ware ask whether the wider treatment of Arabs constitutes an actual apartheid system.

A sit-com series from an Arab writer about Jewish-Arab domestic sensitivities is also meant to suggest awkward but encouraging cohesion. But the propaganda value of such output - implying 'free expression for all' - is never considered by Ware.

Driving into an Arab town in northern Israel, Ware narrates that "most Arabs fled or were evicted" in 1948. It's a passive enough line to impart a basic truth without having to relate the terror of that mass ethnic cleansing and the Zionist militias who enforced it.

Reflecting on the 'failed Oslo' negotiations, Ware laments that Israel and the Palestinians "barely talk any more. They can't agree the terms of two states." Again, evading the Occupation-sustaining details of that loaded Accord, it's the familiar inference that the Palestinians 'lost the chance for peace'.

In the West Bank, Ware relates how, after defeating threatening armies in 1967, Israel was reluctant to give back the territories it had gained, "fearing the Arabs might strike again". Standing on the hills, he looks out in implicit agreement: "it's easy to see why Israel has been so concerned about its security".

And "security" is repeated as the defining reason for the settlement constructions that followed.

The settlements are noted as being illegal - with that ever-handy BBC caveat, "though, Israel disputes this" - and still expanding. But there's no actual explanation of their role in maintaining the Occupation and Israel's colonialist project, nor any linkage to American and Western support for Israel, its vital part in propping-up a militarist-apartheid state never countenanced by Ware.

Up on the sleek city hill settlement of Ma'ale Adumim, Ware is taken supermarket shopping by one of its proud residents. We see the Arab workers allowed in to serve there, the practical accommodations, the apparent harmony.  But never does Ware explore the moral malevolence of such places in the strategic promotion of Zionism and a perpetual Jewish state.  

Internal opposition is voiced from notable Israelis, like writer David Landau, who tells Ware that this "messianic" project is utterly irrational.

The latter may well agree. But what's killing any two state solution for Ware is still the easy liberal line of "mutual distrust", an opinion that includes his barely-disguised agreement that Israel has a case for not ceding any more power to the Palestinian Authority for fear it might eventually lead to a Hamas takeover of the West Bank. 

Ware does question the one state idea based on Jewish constitutional priorities, as proposed by a Likud politician, where Palestinians would be compelled to take citizenship oaths which invoke Israeli sovereignty.

Palestinians are also respectfully heard by Ware, in this regard, conveying their belief that the two state solution is dead and desiring a day when they can travel freely on buses to Jerusalem or the beach at Tel Aviv as free and equal citizens.  Following that aspirational theme, Ware surveys a prestigious Palestinian building project, pondering what might unfold for those lucky enough to get a set of keys. 

But, again, there's no central discussion of the insidious apartheid system preventing those equal freedoms, the deepening political obstacles to such desires or the mass of impoverished Palestinians with no hope of any basic deliverance from their controlled, humiliated and imprisoned lives.

Ware does ultimately come to posit the looming choice for Israel: the world's singular Jewish-only state or a full democratic one for all. With the image of the present state badly "tarnished" by attacks on Gaza and now, worryingly, under pressure from international boycotts, Israel is, he concludes, at that crucial "crossroads". 

Perhaps it is, and this film may have shed a certain light on that gathering dilemma for Israel and Israelis. Ware and his defenders might also say that this film is an actual examination of Israel's future, not Palestine's.  

Yet, at every point and turn in his commentary, Ware avoids the vital issue of rightful self-determination for Palestinians, a space as hollow as the propaganda crust he has sought to pack with Israeli-favoured fillers.   

Ware's concluding remarks leave hanging the possible evolution or continuation of a state that was founded on "secular and democratic" principles by those fleeing persecution.

It's a false and selective narrative which completely ignores the formative Palestinian experience, their loss, their imposed flight and their principal rights to live in a state, polity and society of their choice.