Update – Paul Staines has confirmed his desire that innocents and children be killed wantonly in the comments.
Congratulations to those advertisers who, by association and ad revenue via messagespace, support him and his views, including:
amazon
gievesandhawkes.com, john lewis, blockbuster, british airways holidays, ebay, moneysupermarket.com, talktalk, uswitch, british gas, which – switch with which, lastminute.com, snapfish, ann summers, post office.
After deleting comments and changing content in news articles on its website, Sky News has now publicly stated that it will not broadcast the DEC Gaza appeal.
It’s pretty obvious that the plan, as I mentioned here was to let The BBC take the flak (and stoke the flames in its reports) over the weekend while falsely claiming Sky was still discussing whether or not to run the Disasters Emergency Committee appeal for Gaza.
The TV station had help from its sister company The Times in its deception which, on Friday, said “Sky immediately denied that it had also had reservations.” but Sky News slipped up in an article titled “BBC Under Fire Over Gaza Appeal“, when it published “Mr Thompson said he was concerned that broadcasting the appeal to help Gazans in need of food and shelter might compromise the BBC’s impartiality.
Sky has also refused to run the appeal for the same reason.”
Later, Sky changed the article and removed the comments feature.
If you search for the removed text via Google you will see a listing for the article, but the story is not cached and the url redirects. However, Yahoo uses Sky as a news provider and you can still see its version of the original article (minus comments) here.
And I thought the BBC was cowardly.
Sky manipulated the news for their own benefit and majored on the BBC angle until the day the DEC broadcast was due to run.
Sky News – First for breaking news word.
Related posts:
Tony Blair – Peace Envoy
Who’s picking up the Gaza tab?
Further update :
Sky News has redirected the page linked in my initial post. The new page has a different url, title and contains much of what was in the original linked page. However, Sky has removed the line about it refusing to run the appeal for the same reason as The BBC. There were several comments posted on the old page which is no longer accessible. The new page has no comments – None were carried over.
Original Post
After using weasel words to shift all responsibility onto the BBC, Sky has admitted it will not broadcast the Disasters Emergency Committee Gaza appeal.
From yesterday’s Times:
Sky immediately denied that it had also had reservations. “We were considering this request internally when the DEC contacted us to let us know that the BBC had decided not to broadcast the appeal at this time. As, by convention, if all broadcasters do not carry the appeal then none do, the decision was effectively made for us,” a spokesman said.
Now that ITV has commendably agreed to run the appeal, today, Sky News website says :
“Mr Thompson said he was concerned that broadcasting the appeal to help Gazans in need of food and shelter might compromise the BBC’s impartiality.
Sky has also refused to run the appeal for the same reason.“, under the headline:
“BBC Under Fire Over Gaza Appeal“
Update:
Maybe I missed it first time (I don’t think so) but the linked page now contains the words :
” A spokesman for Sky said: “We have been in discussions with other broadcasters today and we continue to consider the DEC’s request.”"
We shall wait and see now that Channel 4 has also agreed to show the appeal.
I believe the BBC was concerned about the reaction of a vocal minority had it run the appeal, not because they received any direct pressure.
For this reason, I think Tony Benn’s strategy of atack on te BBC (broadcast on BBC News) was totally wrong. By stating with (as far as I am aware) no proof whatsoever that ‘Israel’ put (direct) pressure on the BBC over this, he has moved the issue clearly into the political arena. Despite anyone’s suspicions, the argument for running the DEC appeal should have been solely on humanitarian grounds.
From The Times article:
A nationwide appeal for money to help the Gaza relief effort has been denied free television airtime because the BBC fears that it would damage confidence in the corporation’s impartiality.
According to Sky, “… by convention, if all broadcasters do not carry the appeal then none do,”.
Other channels may have made the same cowardly decision but I doubt we will ever know the truth as it seems The BBC’s spine disintegrated first.
I can’t think of a more effective way to wreck confidence in impartiality than by refusing to publicise a humanitarian appeal.
From The BBC’s The Editors:
The BBC is lucky to have two outstanding producers in our Gaza office, Rushdi Abu Alouf and Hamada Abuqammar. They have been well trained, not least by Alan Johnston, and are giving calm, accurate, accounts of what is happening. Hamas has not imposed any restrictions on their reporting and they have been a model of impeccable journalism, in terrible personal circumstances. Most of us go home when the story is over. Gaza is their home.
How must this man now feel about his employer ? – An employer which relied so heavily on his reporting over the last few weeks.
A great cartoonist.
Maybe I haven’t been looking at his work for long enough – I kind of assumed he majored in humour and didn’t do too much ‘commentary’ if that’s the right word.
However, his most recent work on Gaza has quite an edge to it.
