Robin Shepherd
Think Tank Blog
22 August 09
One suspects that there would have been a different reaction if this had been about racism against blacks. But Sweden has now made it clear that it will not condemn the country’s best selling newspaper for running a two-page spread earlier this week which alleged that Israeli soldiers kidnap Palestinian children to cut out their bodily organs for sale.
This website contacted the Swedish foreign ministry in Sweden asking for clarification. A ministry spokesman, Anders Jorle, said that the Swedish government had “no position on the allegations” and quoted from the blog of foreign minister Carl Bildt where he said that “freedom of expression and press freedom are very strong in our constitution by tradition.”
The story, which ran in the Aftonbladet newspaper, also sought to link the wholly unsubstantiated allegations with the recent arrest in the United States of an American Jew on suspicion of planning to trade a human kidney on the black market. A modernised form of the ancient blood libel against the Jewish people was thus compounded with the inference of collective guilt.
It is strange to say the least that Sweden should invoke freedom of expression as a reason for its silence. If free speech is given such a premium why does the foreign ministry not exercise its own right to free expression by stating a position?
Moreover, if free expression is so sacrosanct why was the Swedish ambassador to Israel forced by the foreign ministry to remove her initial remarks from the embassy’s website in which she said the article was “shocking and appalling”?
Sweden is not being asked to engage in political censorship. It is being asked to do what it does all the time, not least in its frequent criticisms of Israel. It is being asked to make a statement of its political values.
Consider how easy it would have been for the foreign ministry to do the following: to condemn anti-Semitic blood libels, to denounce collective guilt, and to say that it finds baseless allegations about organ theft in Israel deplorable. It would not even have had to make direct reference to the paper in question. But they could not even bring themselves to do that.
To invoke the free speech argument in this case looks more like hiding behind a principle than standing up for one. I think we all know what’s at work.
Postscript: On the basis of an alert reader of this site (see first comment below), I am updating this post to reveal the following.
The Swedish government has not in fact defended free speech with the vigour that is now claimed. On February 10, 2006 the BBC reported that the website of a far-Right political party’s newspaper had been closed down in relation to the Danish cartoon controversy during which cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad caused mass protests by Muslim groups in Europe and around the world.
The Swedish government had been instrumental, the BBC reported, in pushing the website’s host to pull the plug. The newspaper called Kuriren — the paper of the Swedish Democrats — had called on readers to submit their own cartoons of Mohammad in solidarity with the Danish originators of the controversy who were in hiding in fear for their lives.
Showing none of the high-minded support for the complete independence of the press now being claimed, then foreign minister Laila Freivalds called the paper’s move “a provocation”.
“I will defend freedom of the press no matter what the circumstances, but I strongly condemn the provocation by SD-Kuriren. It displays a complete lack of respect,” the BBC quoted her as saying.
It appears that the paper managed to get its site back up. But the difference between the reaction of the Swedish foreign ministry to the feelings of Muslims and the feelings of Jews is plain for all to see.
To read the BBC article, click here:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/4700414.stm
To read the latest on the current saga, click here:
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1249418665710&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
Also see Hypocrisy Buster Says:
August 22nd, 2009 at 10:59 am
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/4700414.stm
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