Financial Times of London's Bias Against Israel Attracts Attention

Cartoon appearing on the Financial Times' Rachman blog

CAMERA/Snapshots
03 February '10

The Financial Times of London (FT) is a prominent business-oriented newspaper with an international reach. Over the years its slanted coverage of the Arab-Israeli conflict has attracted notice. Two recent pieces expose the depths of this bias.

Just Journalism, an independent media research group based in the UK, published an investigative report that assesses 121 Financial Times editorials relating to the Middle East over the past year. According to Just Journalism board member Robin Shepherd, "This report demonstrates that the FT has repeatedly disregarded salient facts when it comes to the Middle East and disproportionately blames Israel for the region’s woes."

The report finds that

1. The FT views Israel as primarily responsible for the perpetuation of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, while downplaying other factors. Other aggravating factors such as terrorism, disunity within Palestinian ranks and a failure to accept Israel as a Jewish state are downplayed.

2. The prospect of an Israeli attack on Iranian nuclear facilities is referred to in five editorials; yet no Financial Times editorial in 2009 makes reference to the threatening rhetoric from Iran’s President Ahmadinejad against Israel.

(Read full post)
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Candidly Speaking: 'Perfidious Albion' and Jewish leaders

Isi Leibler
JPost
02 November 09

The British and French foreign ministers, both of whom have Jewish ancestors, are now among the most vociferous European critics of Israel. This was reaffirmed by their odious "absence" from the vote on the Goldstone Report at the UN Human Rights Council.

Under these circumstances one would expect leaders of the well-established Anglo-Jewish community to have lobbied their government in advance and made it aware of the sentiments shared by the vast majority of British Jews.

However, the Board of Deputies of British Jews, which purports to be the voice of Anglo-Jewry, procrastinated until after the UN vote. This was no surprise because Anglo-Jewish leaders have a long tradition of burying their heads in the sand, determined not to rock the boat under any circumstances.

A few years ago, Henry Grunwald, the recently retired president of the Board of Deputies, even wrote an op-ed in The Jerusalem Post expressing pride in the effectiveness of a policy based on "whispering" rather than "shouting."

That approach is reflected by public demonstrations of solidarity with the Jewish state being deferred until forced under pressure from the Jewish street; inadequately confronting anti-Semites like the former mayor of London; and insufficiently opposing those seeking to boycott and delegitimize Israel.

THREE RECENT disconcerting events signal that the newly elected Board of Deputies president, Vivian Wineman (a former head of the UK branches of Peace Now and the New Israel Fund) is unlikely to deviate from this craven approach.
(Full Article)
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