Skip to main content

An open letter to Question Time panel. 31 May 2012


An open letter to Alan Duncan, Stella Creasy, Mark Oaten, Fraser Nelson and Victoria Coren, regarding last night's (31st May 2012) Question Time on BBC Television. 
 
At 24 minutes into the programme, a Mr Simon MacCausland asked “Would the UK be justified in banning Syrian delegation members with connections to the Assad regime, from the London 2012 Olympics?”

The uprising in Syria has been on going for over a year and during that time, there have been numerous atrocities carried out across the country but, regardless of who carried out this latest atrocity in Houla, be it “armed gangs” as claimed by the Assad regime, or Assad's forces and militia as claimed by the opposition, this event in itself should be recognised as a crime against humanity and those responsible should be held to account. The debate and comments during the next 11 minutes was predominately centred on the barbarity of the Assad regime and what, if anything, could be done by the international community to change the situation. It is clear to me that the problems in Syria are intensely complex and achieving a solution will be difficult if not impossible, given the current attitude of at least two of the UN security council members.
The debate among the panel touched on many options ranging from military intervention to more sanctions with Fraser Nelson at on stage saying that “We tend to shape the world rather than be shaped by it. We are the country that helps people who are being oppressed on the other side of the world.”
It was at this point that I became acutely aware of a glaring omission in the exchanges. The killing of civilians, particularly children in systematic attacks by government forces is an odious and unforgivable event. It is no more or less odious in Syria as it is in Gaza or Hebron or any of the other of the towns and villages of the occupied territories and the West Bank. To debate for over 10 minutes, the atrocity of Houla, without one single mention of the daily atrocities in Palestine, is by any standards insensitive. It seems to be yet another example of the media generally and sadly many people, ignoring a situation which has been deteriorating rapidly over recent years because presumably, it does not “fit in” with the accepted perceptions, or Palestinians do not really matter, or Israel is involved so we had better remain silent.
This seems to be the general level of today's debate where the subject of Palestine is concerned.
Ladies and gentlemen of the panel, it was an interesting exchange and I would have preferred to be in the audience to make these points. However, should you be in similar circumstances in the future, please bear in mind that there are places other than Syria where civilians are being terrorised.



Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Enough of this hysterical nonsense

  http://style.uk.msn.com/royal-baby/how-will-the-royal-baby-look-as-he-grows-up Media generated hysteria.                           This is too much. For the last 36 hours (thought it seems more like 36 days) there has been wall to wall news coverage, media and television comment and reporting, with Sky News taking first prize for frenzied minute by minute reporting from the Palace, the hospital, from a village somewhere in England, from the studio and anywhere else that Burley, Botting and company could stick a microphone into some obscure "celebrity's" face and ask for yet another banal quote. All this galvanising the mass hysteria of some elements of the public, (who the media would have you believe is the reaction of "the whole world",) with their flag waving, dancing, singing and cheering over what is after all, no more than a woman having a bab...

New Agenda on Sunday is out Sunday, Apr. 28, 2019

https://paper.li/f-1346065353#/ Good morning everyone. Last weeks scare regarding Megan and Harry being sent to live "somewhere in Africa" seems to have been dispelled, at least for the time being. It now seems that the Duke and Duchess of Sussex will take up residence in California.  Unless  they are actually  doing  some proper work in "The Golden State", I hope that they are taken off the civil list so that we do not have to fund their life choice. The nauseating Daily Mail is at it again. A headline this week, which I will not even bother to reproduce here, screams out in disgusting and repulsive bias without any acknowledgement to the factual basis of their "story". Spewing out their usual smears and embellished distortions about Hamas, the IRA, Hezbollah and the rest, the Mail condemns itself with ample justification, for the closure of a "newspaper," which again abuses 10 fold, the privilege of "freedom of t...

A perverse and rather sinister media obsession to discredit, smear and undermine Jeremy Corbyn

http://www.standard.co.uk/news/uk/venezuela-jeremy-corbyn-blasted-for-not-condemning-president-maduro-a3606156.html#commentsDiv Venezuela: Jeremy Corbyn blasted for not condemning socialist President Nicolas Maduro as violent conflict escalates There is a perverse and rather sinister obsesseion with the media and particularly television "interveiwers", in seeking to secure from Jeremy Corbyn a "condemnation" of some person or organisation or event. This time it is connected with events in Venezuela and the actions of President Nicolas Maduro and the bloody crackdown on protests against the result of last weeks poll which inaugurated a constituent assembly . The media "stories" and the interrogation by the television interviewers, are as subtle as a sledgehammer being nothing more than a variation on the "Have you stopped beating your wife yet?" question, which so many repoters use in order for them to make themselves appear very ...