Journalism beyond the mainstream
JVL Introduction
Palestine Deep Dive has started an important new series of monthly conversations, The Walkout, in which journalists who have worked for the BBC, CNN and other mainstream media discuss the experiences that led them to leave. Their exchanges live up to the “Deep Dive” description, as participants reveal details of the inner workings of major news organisations, the irresistible pressures confronting journalists eager to live up their ideals as truth-tellers but blocked by systems and structures that work against them.
Fronting the series is former BBC journalist and newsreader Karishma Patel, whose interview with Ahmed Alnaouq was broadcast two weeks ago. She describes her idealistic devotion to the concept of public service journalism the BBC is supposed to represent, and the overwhelming obstacles that finally forced her out of the newsroom.
See below links to that interview and to Patel’s conversation on August 19 with Ana Maria Monjardino who left CNN in October 2023.
Monjardino reflects on the challenges of platforming Palestinian voices in mainstream media, discusses independent journalism, impartiality and objectivity, and her subsequent work in Latin America.
August 5, 2026. Karishma Patel talks to Ahmed Alnaouq about the reasons behind her resignation from the BBC. She was inspired by public service journalism, starting out with the idea, “To fight for justice, to follow truth. Where better than the BBC?” She quickly discovered that working in the newsroom meant negotiating many obstacles, describing an Orwellian atmosphere in which you could see the fear in presenters’ eyes if a Palestinian was speaking clearly about genocide or what Israel was doing. She says “The question ‘Do you condemn Hamas?’ would erupt out of their panic.”
August 19, 2026 – Ana Maria Monjardino explains her decision to give up her career at CNN. She reflects on the challenges of platforming Palestinian voices in mainstream media, why she ultimately resigned, and what she learned about journalism after leaving one of the world’s biggest news organisations. She and Patel also discuss independent journalism, impartiality and objectivity, and her own subsequent reporting on Palestine-Israel in Latin America.
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I don’t listen or watch legacy media. They exist to work for the state in order to tell the people what and who to fear.
The imagined threats are likely to be acts derived by the state in order to give the people example of fear.
So it is vital independent news with no attachment to the state is what people should be reading and listing to.
Legacy media exist to do the work of state and propagate the people imagined fears and hate.
Thank you very much for bringing ‘Deep Dive’ to our attention, one to add to my ever increasing list of indie sources. Not had chance to watch the second interview yet but shall follow the series with interest.
The first video brought to mind the BBC’s collusion in the anti-semitism smears against Corbyn, particularly the dreadful ‘Panorama’ programme about the so called ‘whistleblowers’. (And adding insult to injury, Starmer using Labour Party Members hard earned cash to pay the latter off, at which point I left the Party….).
I fear the ‘rot set in’ at the BBC a long time before October 2023, and it is many years since I have watched it. As one who fondly remembers when the BBC was indeed ‘world beating’ with journalists worth the name (I mean absolutely no disrespect to Ms Patel and her like minded colleagues) it makes me very sad indeed.
Thanks Naomi for this- Patel is so brave, and what a loss to the BBC, that has become in effect a journalistic clown show and vassal entity of Israel. The ICJ part was fascinating and reminds me of how newsnight avoided the story entirely! There you go, that’s legacy media BBC in a nutshell, and that’s what we pay the licence fee for. Not on.