In which I make a complaint to the head of NZ's public broadcaster for giving the Israeli Ambassador - 6 months into a genocidal war - free reign to lie, obfuscate and smear the Palestinian people.
Hi Diana - thanks for this article, no, I hadn't seen it. It's a searing indictment of Western governments - I'm going to share it on my Twitter right now!! Craig Murray is a good and honourable man who isn't frightened to tell truth to power. "This genocide is the desired goal of the West. No other explanation is remotely plausible" - he's absolutely right. I am completely heart-broken by everything that's happening right now - the terrible suffering in Gaza, the suffering in the West Bank, the murderous hatred of the Israelis and the complicity of all our Western governments - including my own here in tiny little NZ. I feel like I'm yelling at clouds writing and tweeting about it but it's better than doing nothing at all.
I guess we just do whatever it is we can do . . . attend local protests, write Substack articles, rant about it on social media (which I do a LOT). The more of us who step up and do something, no matter how little, the more the pressure for change will build. One thing that's giving me hope right now is the college protests in the US - bless their cotton socks!
They give me hope too, and so does the BDS movement. And I hope people in the USA consider voting for Jill Stein instead of either of the two creepy candidates who both support this genocide. She was just released from jail for protesting, and I now have so much respect for her after watching this video. https://twitter.com/i/status/1784710631100391771
It's a sad country we live in, this coalition government taking sides and not having the guts to stand up for what's right, too busy kissing up to the U.S. also our media is bias, NZ hearld, rnz, stuff there's no real journalism in our country.
It is sad - and so frustrating. And yes, our media is abysmal - they have been pretty bad for a long while now but their treatment of the Gaza issue has really scraped the bottom of the barrel.
Many thanks for a thorough and thoughtful discussion of the dreadful role our media and in particular, our national TV provider in the horrendous genocide Israel is perpetrating in Gaza. The simple fact is that without idiots like Tame the crimes against Palestinians would stop today. Only the propaganda poured over our communities like a blanket of crude oil, filling our eyes and ears, seeping minute by minute into our heads, enables the atrocities to continue. Fighters like yourself should be proud of the work you do exposing the lies, sweeping aside the fog of smears and helping end the genocide. Good citizen journalism is alive and well. Kia kaha.
Thanks so much Maurice - and yes, our media's role in this genocide (and in everything that preceded it for the last 75 years) is massive. They've helped Israel white-wash itself - covering up its crimes and even outright lying for it for far, far too long and if the media had been doing their job rather than acting as a PR arm for Israel (and its master the US) it is very unlikely we would have come to such a terrible place.
Thankyou so much for this clear and thorough dissection of the shameful Q&A interview. I sat watching slack-jawed as Jack Tame destroyed his own credibility. I wondered if he was seriously ill. He even repeated the “1400 deaths on October 7” story, though even the Israelis admitted months ago the figure was around 1150, many of which were at the hands of the IDF.
Thanks Kath - and yes, the interview was just awful. I suspect Jack may have received instructions for what he could and couldn't say - in which case he should have told them that he couldn't do the interview. To sell out your own journalistic credibility the way he did in this interview was just shameful.
Sadly NZ is no different - we are a settler-colonial state just like the US, Canada and Australia and we are a staunch ally of the US. Our current government is looking to strengthen those ties even further which - given all the sabre-rattling the US is currently doing towards China - is very concerning.
As an immigrant to this country ( 1989) I learnt very quickly that your state television was biased towards American interests which came as no surprise to me. It’s just one of those weird colonial/ commonwealth/ British Empire things that seem to never change.
Good article thanks. Did you submit a formal complaint? In any case let us know what the response is.
I like your comparison with the approach they'd take viz Russia but they are not in the same ballpark comparatively speaking. For example I believe some 10,000 civilians and around 600 children have been killed in the 2 years since 2022, whereas Gaza it is 34,000 civilians, 14,000 of which are children in just 7 months... It should be increasingly clear to everyone just how US/UK mal-aligned our MSM and "security state" have become.
Hi Malcolm - thanks for commenting. I haven't submitted a formal complain yet - I was (foolishly as it turns out) awaiting a reply from TVNZ. Thus far I have received none. I'll look into making a formal complaint next. On Sunday they did an interview with a rep from the Palestinian Authority as 'balance' and it was a shocker - Tame was so much more combative than he was with the Israeli Ambassador & trotted out Israeli talking points like a good little boy. And yes, I agree that Russia and Gaza are not in the same ballpark - nowhere near - I made the comparison without acknowledging that because I wanted to try and get the idiots at TVNZ on-side with the main point I was making. My opinions about the Russia-Ukraine war would immediately put me beyond the pale with them I suspect!! And yes, we are entirely US/UK mal-aligned. And now the current government is talking about joining AUKUS!!
Formal complaints under broadcasting standards are easy but need to be done within 20 working days of broadcast (from memory). By doing this their committee is obliged to formally respond so it's well worth it - Given the follow-on ' balance' interview I suggest you include both because one of their arguments against a 'single' event would be that they don't need to be balanced as long as over-time they provide a counter balance. In any case the standard allows so much wriggle room for them your complaint will almost definitely not be upheld but at least it's "registered". Re Russia-Ukraine, yes my response was with sense of (false) irony and wondered whether you may have thought that too. Keep up the good work.
The whole western world is doing stuff like this, Karyn. It's unbelievable.
Have you seen this article by Craig Murray? https://consortiumnews.com/2024/04/26/craig-murray-worse-than-you-can-imagine/?eType=EmailBlastContent&eId=ab6bdf76-7c5d-4a0f-9d4f-479c7df1a70b
Its implications are terrifying.
Hi Diana - thanks for this article, no, I hadn't seen it. It's a searing indictment of Western governments - I'm going to share it on my Twitter right now!! Craig Murray is a good and honourable man who isn't frightened to tell truth to power. "This genocide is the desired goal of the West. No other explanation is remotely plausible" - he's absolutely right. I am completely heart-broken by everything that's happening right now - the terrible suffering in Gaza, the suffering in the West Bank, the murderous hatred of the Israelis and the complicity of all our Western governments - including my own here in tiny little NZ. I feel like I'm yelling at clouds writing and tweeting about it but it's better than doing nothing at all.
Karyn, I feel the very same way. I'm still stunned by this article and just wrote a post about it. What in hell do we do?! I wish I knew...
She’s amazing- a woman of principle in a political world severely lacking in it. All power to her 😍🇵🇸❤️
I guess we just do whatever it is we can do . . . attend local protests, write Substack articles, rant about it on social media (which I do a LOT). The more of us who step up and do something, no matter how little, the more the pressure for change will build. One thing that's giving me hope right now is the college protests in the US - bless their cotton socks!
They give me hope too, and so does the BDS movement. And I hope people in the USA consider voting for Jill Stein instead of either of the two creepy candidates who both support this genocide. She was just released from jail for protesting, and I now have so much respect for her after watching this video. https://twitter.com/i/status/1784710631100391771
It's a sad country we live in, this coalition government taking sides and not having the guts to stand up for what's right, too busy kissing up to the U.S. also our media is bias, NZ hearld, rnz, stuff there's no real journalism in our country.
It is sad - and so frustrating. And yes, our media is abysmal - they have been pretty bad for a long while now but their treatment of the Gaza issue has really scraped the bottom of the barrel.
Many thanks for a thorough and thoughtful discussion of the dreadful role our media and in particular, our national TV provider in the horrendous genocide Israel is perpetrating in Gaza. The simple fact is that without idiots like Tame the crimes against Palestinians would stop today. Only the propaganda poured over our communities like a blanket of crude oil, filling our eyes and ears, seeping minute by minute into our heads, enables the atrocities to continue. Fighters like yourself should be proud of the work you do exposing the lies, sweeping aside the fog of smears and helping end the genocide. Good citizen journalism is alive and well. Kia kaha.
Thanks so much Maurice - and yes, our media's role in this genocide (and in everything that preceded it for the last 75 years) is massive. They've helped Israel white-wash itself - covering up its crimes and even outright lying for it for far, far too long and if the media had been doing their job rather than acting as a PR arm for Israel (and its master the US) it is very unlikely we would have come to such a terrible place.
Thankyou so much for this clear and thorough dissection of the shameful Q&A interview. I sat watching slack-jawed as Jack Tame destroyed his own credibility. I wondered if he was seriously ill. He even repeated the “1400 deaths on October 7” story, though even the Israelis admitted months ago the figure was around 1150, many of which were at the hands of the IDF.
Thanks Kath - and yes, the interview was just awful. I suspect Jack may have received instructions for what he could and couldn't say - in which case he should have told them that he couldn't do the interview. To sell out your own journalistic credibility the way he did in this interview was just shameful.
I thought NZ was different… I thought wrong
Sadly NZ is no different - we are a settler-colonial state just like the US, Canada and Australia and we are a staunch ally of the US. Our current government is looking to strengthen those ties even further which - given all the sabre-rattling the US is currently doing towards China - is very concerning.
As an immigrant to this country ( 1989) I learnt very quickly that your state television was biased towards American interests which came as no surprise to me. It’s just one of those weird colonial/ commonwealth/ British Empire things that seem to never change.
We are definitely part of the Anglophone West here in NZ - which is such a shame- and our media definitely reflects that 🙁
Good article thanks. Did you submit a formal complaint? In any case let us know what the response is.
I like your comparison with the approach they'd take viz Russia but they are not in the same ballpark comparatively speaking. For example I believe some 10,000 civilians and around 600 children have been killed in the 2 years since 2022, whereas Gaza it is 34,000 civilians, 14,000 of which are children in just 7 months... It should be increasingly clear to everyone just how US/UK mal-aligned our MSM and "security state" have become.
Hi Malcolm - thanks for commenting. I haven't submitted a formal complain yet - I was (foolishly as it turns out) awaiting a reply from TVNZ. Thus far I have received none. I'll look into making a formal complaint next. On Sunday they did an interview with a rep from the Palestinian Authority as 'balance' and it was a shocker - Tame was so much more combative than he was with the Israeli Ambassador & trotted out Israeli talking points like a good little boy. And yes, I agree that Russia and Gaza are not in the same ballpark - nowhere near - I made the comparison without acknowledging that because I wanted to try and get the idiots at TVNZ on-side with the main point I was making. My opinions about the Russia-Ukraine war would immediately put me beyond the pale with them I suspect!! And yes, we are entirely US/UK mal-aligned. And now the current government is talking about joining AUKUS!!
Formal complaints under broadcasting standards are easy but need to be done within 20 working days of broadcast (from memory). By doing this their committee is obliged to formally respond so it's well worth it - Given the follow-on ' balance' interview I suggest you include both because one of their arguments against a 'single' event would be that they don't need to be balanced as long as over-time they provide a counter balance. In any case the standard allows so much wriggle room for them your complaint will almost definitely not be upheld but at least it's "registered". Re Russia-Ukraine, yes my response was with sense of (false) irony and wondered whether you may have thought that too. Keep up the good work.
Thanks for the heads-up re time-frame for complaints Malcolm. And yes, will include both interviews/ thanks again for taking the time to comment 😊