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Why BBC doesn't call Hamas militants 'terrorists' - John Simpson (www.bbc.co.uk)

submitted 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) by Nighed@sffa.community to c/world@lemmy.world

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I guess not strictly news - but with all of the vitriol I have seen in discussions on the Israel situation, that have boiled down to arguments over wording, I feel that this take from the BBC is worthy of some discussion.

Mods, feel free to remove if this is not newsy enough.

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[-] alquicksilver@lemmy.world 167 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

It's simply not the BBC's job to tell people who to support and who to condemn - who are the good guys and who are the bad guys.

I miss when this was the standard for news. Now most (e: major) outlets don't even try to pretend they have no bias and instead push a subjective point. Even when I agree with the point, I don't like it when my "news" pushes it instead of just, you know, reporting.

Give me the info and let me form my own opinions.

[-] makingStuffForFun@lemmy.ml 44 points 1 year ago

The news in Australia literally adds dramatic music to their edits. They're disgraceful, and manipulative.

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[-] Nighed@sffa.community 36 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

While us Brits love to complain about the BBC being biased (probably an actual issue for internal UK politics) its good to remember that it's still a world leading media outlet, and one of very few that can be considered not to be push an agenda. (I imagine I can find a lot of people that can probably disagree with that too....)

Even Routers has started editorialising, and I thought they were just meant to be raw facts!

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[-] Maven@lemmy.sdf.org 89 points 1 year ago

The same thing's happening in Canada with the CBC; bunch of people calling them out for not saying "terrorist" implying it means they're in favour of the attacks, when CBC simply has a policy of not saying that about anyone, because it's not their job.

[-] can@sh.itjust.works 42 points 1 year ago

This is why we need CBC and can't let the Conservative Party of Canada destroy them.

[-] Wilibus@lemmy.world 16 points 1 year ago

I generally don't like the CBC, but I personally find their international political reporting top tier due to this kind of approach.

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[-] plz1@lemmy.world 41 points 1 year ago

It’s so refreshing to see real journalistic integrity once in a while. Thanks for sharing.

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[-] xantoxis@lemmy.world 31 points 1 year ago

This is hardcore and I respect the shit out of it

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[-] TheBlue22@lemmy.blahaj.zone 23 points 1 year ago

I don't think you need to call hamas what they are, a far right fundamentalist extremist terrorist organisation. Their actions speak for themselves.

[-] LemmyRefugee@lemmy.world 16 points 1 year ago

What they mean as that they could also say Israel is a terrorist state. That’s what some people think. And some people, specially those who have friends or family who have been killed in Palestina, might say that Hamas are defending their people and are not terrorists.
But you and me, citizens without voice, can call them terrorists (that’s what they are) but doing so we are somehow chosing a band in a conflict.

[-] HelixDab2@lemm.ee 16 points 1 year ago

I'm not sure I'd call Israel a terrorist state, but absolutely an apartheid state.

If you live in Gaza, you really don't have a lot to lose by attacking Israeli non-combatants, because you have no hope, and the Israeli gov't keeps going farther and farther to the right. Gaza looks a lot like the Warsaw ghettos prior to rounding all the Jews up and murdering them. The uprisings in the Warsaw ghetto were punished with the same kind of wildly disproportionate force as we're already seeing Israel use against Gaza.

Hamas and Palestinian militants were, and are, wrong to target and murder non-combatants. And, at the same time, Israel has been doing exactly the same fucking thing for 20-odd years now; from 2008 through 2020, more than 120,000 Palestinians--mostly non-combatants--were wounded or killed by the Israeli military. In that same time period, 6,000 Israelis were wounded or killed by Palestinian militants.

Israel can not claim to be a democracy, because they refuse to give Palestinians a voice in government at all.

As an aside, the parallels between how Israel has treated Palestinians, and how the US has treated Native Americans is uncomfortable.

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[-] makingStuffForFun@lemmy.ml 22 points 1 year ago

John Simpson is a legend. His book, A Mad World, My Masters, is exceptional reading.

[-] IchNichtenLichten@lemmy.world 12 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

The guy has been reporting since before many of us were even born. If you can catch his show on the BBC it's a great antidote to the sensationalized, biased reporting that passes for journalism these days.

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt18289996/

[-] Steve@startrek.website 17 points 1 year ago

Based

[-] redhydride@lemmy.ml 17 points 1 year ago

Commendable to resist such pressure and remain as objective as possible

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this post was submitted on 11 Oct 2023

615 points (96.7% liked)

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