A different BBC documentary, the same old racist refrain about Palestine
JVL Introduction
Amidst all the furore about Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone, discussed in illuminating detail by Richard Sanders in this interview with Owen Jones, the BBC has broadcast a three-part series by the acclaimed documentary maker Norma Percy under the title Israel and the Palestinians: The Road to 7th October.
It would be good to be able to say that Percy’s work in some way atoned for the BBC’s craven collapse in withdrawing from public view a film that justly represented Palestinian voices. Unfortunately this is far from the case.
Jonathan Cook is on excoriating form in the piece we publish below, outlining the utterly discredited premise underlying the whole series, which has the United States as the star of the show, its officials portrayed as honest brokers desperately trying to bring about peace and being constantly “hamstrung by bad luck and the intransigence of those involved.”
This says Cook, “breathes life back into a racist western narrative – one that made the genocide in Gaza possible, and justifies Israel’s return this month to using mass starvation as a weapon of war against the Palestinian people.”
NWI
This article was originally published by Jonathan Cook's substack on Sun 9 Mar 2025. Read the original here.
New BBC documentary 'The Road to 7th October' is an utter travesty
Pressured into removing a humanising portrait of Gaza’s children, the BBC offers instead a series on Israel-Palestine that frantically revives the very narrative that made the genocide possible
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The whole of the UK’s MSM [mainstream media] is so biased against the Palestinians, and so under the influence of Zionism that one is better off going to read Haaretz [though most of its output is behind a paywall].
Where in the UK would you get an editorial headline saying “If You Support Continuing the Gaza War, You Support Sacrificing the Hostages”.
“Given all the grandstanding about resuming the war, it’s important to underline the implication of such a move: sacrificing hostages’ lives. THEN “We must not let the government sweep the truth under the rug. There is no scenario in which resuming the war will lead to the release of the hostages. Therefore, supporting the resumption of the war is tantamount to supporting the sacrifice of the hostages.”
All we have here is double-speak reporting.
The title of this programme, ‘Israel and the Palestinians’ is something of a giveaway. Why not ‘Israel and Palestine’? Everybody who’s followed this complete madness know the answer to that.
God article, but you need to spell Jonathan Cook correctly!
I stand corrected!
Excellent deconstruction. The fact that all we hear from are members of the political establishments is a clear warning to viewers of its standpoint.
At least ‘No Other Land’ has also aired of British television.
This line is absurd. Norma Piercy’s documentary gives an appropriately piercing close-up of the ghastly crew of American diplomats , politicians and schemers (aka planners). It gives a respectful and clear hearing to the Hamas leaders — since assassinated. I for one valued the chance to see the faces of the main actors close up, as with Piercy’s series on former Yugoslavia. I consider this series a better piece of work than the film about Gaza’s children which we have mostly been defending, though of course neither should be taken down.
Editors, I’m worried about this lurch into hosting tin-ear rhetoric. Imo a second offence from Jonathan Cook, who has also written wonderful and important things in the past. Please can you be a bit more selective? This crisis and horror is driving us all near to madness but we don’t need attacks on a very fine documentary series.