How do you make 8,000 live rockets disappear?

Day 23. Now this is an odd question.  Why would anyone want to make rockets disappear?  Why indeed.  Yet the BBC and Sky News on their websites have managed it.  I undertook a swift review of both the online sites and couldn’t see any mention of rockets being fired from Gaza into Israel.  Both broadcasters in their summaries so far concentrated only on the attacks from Israel, nothing or very little about the continued rocket attacks by Hamas.

So that’s how it’s done.  Just tell only one side of the story, and whilst you do, show reports from reporters in Gaza who are local, known to Hamas and can be relied upon to toe the Hamas party line.

Since the 7^th October 8,000 rockets have been fired towards Israel.  Allowing for a 30% failure of the rockets either blowing up on the ground or crashing before getting across the border.  That still means 5,600 missiles getting into Israel.  Over 20 days that amounts to 280 a day.  Pause there for a moment.  Every day, on mean average since 7 October 280 rockets have appeared in the sky above Israeli towns and villages carrying their own message of death and destruction.

Just now though, these have just disappeared.  Hardly any mention of them in the news, just relentless reporting on how bad things are in Gaza.  The journalism in relation to these reports is execrable.  We have already seen the BBC (and other broadcasters) taking the word of Hamas as gospel in relation to the hospital car park incident last week.  No verification, no questioning of how Hamas could have counted 500 bodies in 5 minutes, just blind acceptance of a terrorist organisation with a long, long history of distorting information.

According to Hamas the only people killed in the air strikes have been civilians.  There has been no mention at all of combatant casualties.  Nothing.  And the BBC and Sky are more than happy to let that go, in the same way they have forgotten about the rockets.

So what can be done?  The Ofcom website in relation to making a complaint about the BBC says the following: You must complain directly to the BBC first and reach the end of the BBC’s complaints process. Ofcom can only consider your complaint if you’ve already complained to the BBC, or in exceptional circumstances.

My view on complaining to the BBC is don’t bother.  It’s a waste of time since they have a long history of rejecting complaints when it comes to bias against Israel.  Rely then on the ‘exceptional circumstances’ part in the Ofcom guide.  When it comes to online material, it is so important that reports which are clearly biased need to be removed or corrected as a matter of urgency.  We do not have the luxury of time to wait for weeks for the BBC – any other broadcaster for that matter – to reach their inevitable conclusion that there is no bias, or that it was reasonable to rely on a terrorist organisation for information.

These truly are exceptional circumstances, since the more biased reports about Israel are published, the greater the animosity towards British Jews.  Research is absolutely clear on this, that an increase in hostility between Israel and Hamas will have a knock-on effect here in the UK.  Biased reporting of that hostility inevitably makes matters worse, hence the need for speed in addressing the complaint.

Go to www.ofcom.org.uk, seek out the complaints section and make your complaint.  Sadly, to use a military term, looking for bias against Israel in the media is a target rich environment.  Pick the worse examples you can find and lodge your complaint, and whilst you are about it, let your MP know.

This war is being fought on many fronts, including pushing back on the lies and distortion promulgated online and in the print media.  This part of the war effort is so important, and made so much more so by the disappearing missiles.