The Murdochs and the Middle East
The Skimmer 10:24am
Rupert Murdoch is such a hard-right supporter of Israel -- Ariel Sharon was his great hero (he even visited him on his farm) -- that many regard him as a Zionist. So the staunchly pro-Israel Wall Street Journal has nothing to fear on that front as the Murdoch tentacles get to grips with it.
The same might not be true for Murdoch's London titles -- The Times, The Sunday Times, The Sun and News of the World -- all strongly pro-Israel under the guidance of Murdoch's heavy hand. But that might be about to change for these newspapers are all now under the control of Murdoch's son, James, who has pronounced pro-Palestinian views which he holds strongly.
Consider the following, from Alastair Campbell's Diaries, which most commentators seem to have missed. At a private dinner with his father, his brother (Lachlan), Tony Blair, and others at 10 Downing Street in January 2002, James, according to Campbell, launched into a foul-mouthed tirade against his father's unstinting support for Israel.
The elder Murdoch, writes Campbell, "was at one point putting the traditional very right-wing view on Israel and the Middle East peace process and James said that he was ‘talking f****** nonsense.'
"[Rupert] Murdoch said he didn't see what the Palestinians' problem was and James said that it was that they were kicked out of their f****** homes and had nowhere to f****** live' " records Campbell.A contrite James then apologised for swearing at the Prime Minister's dinner table -- but he did not resile from the sentiments of his pro-Palestinian outburst.
It would be quite a shift if the Murdoch papers became pro-Palestinian -- and a matter for grave concern among the pro-Israeli lobby. But maybe there's a crumb of comfort: the new editor of The Times, James Harding, is Jewish. Even so, the days of Murdoch's London papers' slavish support for Israel would seem to be over.
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Comments
Tony Makara
December 11th, 2007 2:50pmWhat we really need is an objective view on middle-east affairs. Fair honest and even-handed reporting. We already get enough bias from the BBC on the middle-east, so we need dispassionate reporting from the print media. Taking a pro-Israeli or anti-Israeli stance is ultimately going to give people a false picture of Israel.
davka
December 11th, 2007 10:27pmHow can one talk of a pro-Israel bias in the media when one of te greatest injustices of the conflict - the expulsion of one million Jewish refugees from THEIR homes in Arab lands - is routinely omitted, when rocket and shooting attacks on Israelis are never mentioned, and Palestinian incitement to murder is barely touched upon.
David Lindsay
December 12th, 2007 2:40pmEffective though The Lobby in the US certainly is, it is an amateur operation compared The Lobby in Britain. Take out every copy of the Times, the Daily Telegraph, the Daily Mail and the Sun, and just how many newspapers are actually bought in Britain on any given weekday? Not very many at all. Yet how many Telegraph or Mail readers, in particular, really are as pro-Israeli as all that? Quite a lot, no doubt. But, equally doubtless, quite a lot most certainly are not. Ah, you may counter, what about the BBC? Well, what about it? Particularly on the mighty Radio Four, much of its coverage of the Middle East now seems to consist of extended discussions (not least featuring Melanie Phillips, who sometimes uses those platforms to claim that she can't get a platform) of allegations of bias on its own part. And then there is the bought and paid for political influence, only just becoming exposed.
Laura
December 12th, 2007 4:53pmDavid Lindsay I don't know what world you are living in, but the British media is filled with anti-Israel invective. The Israel lobby has nothing on the arab lobby.
Max Kaye
December 12th, 2007 5:06pmDavid Lindsay says: "And then there is the bought and paid for political influence, only just becoming exposed". Surely you're not alluding to David Abrahams? Those cunning Zionists who control most of the world's media and banking system and work according to ancient secret protocols are surely too smart to use such a pathetic politico-groupie (which is the real reason he donates to Nu-Labour)