Why is there no coverage of Al Jazeera’s “The Labour Files”?
JVL Introduction
This video is essential viewing for anyone who watched, or is interested in, The Labour Files documentary series by Al Jazeera. Here Mark Seddon is in conversation with Richard Sanders and Peter Oborne who, in very reasonable tones, discuss what they found in researching the series, their shock at the attacks on ordinary, decent Labour members and their near bewilderment at the lack of interest from mainstream journalists who had been quick to amplify attacks on Jeremy Corbyn, often based on rumour or a one sided interpretation of minimal “evidence”.
This article was originally published by Palestine Deep Dive on Fri 7 Oct 2022. Read the original here.
In Conversation: the Makers of Al Jazeera's The Labour Files - Richard Sanders & Peter Oborne
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Funnily enough a few hours ago I thought I’d do a search re>al jazeera labour files< to see if any of the MSM have covered them yet (the LAST time I did so was about a week ago). I didn't expect to find anything, so I was somewhat surprised to find that there was an article in the Independent, published yesterday. It's an opinion piece, and mainly focuses on part 3:
‘The Labour Files’ exposes a toxic right-wing culture poisoning our party
https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/labour-files-forde-report-keir-starmer-racism-b2198773.html#comments-area
Needless to say, there are shills posting in the Comments section trying to discredit the documentaries and Al Jazeera!
Why is there no coverage of Al Jazeera’s “The Labour Files”?
Why is there no coverage of Al Jazeera’s “The Lobby”?
Why is there no coverage of Saudi Arabia’s war on Yemen?
Why is there no coverage of Iraqi babies cruel birth defects after the US used Uranium based munitions in the country?
Why was Desmond Tutu’s condemnation of Apartheid Israel and demand for Blair’s prosecution omitted from most obituaries?
Why do Tony Blair’s victims and Apartheid Israel’s annual death tolls of Palestinian children NOT count as members of the human race to the BBC? A cat locked in a wheelie-bin gets bigger coverage than indigenous victims of the west.
Put simply we don’t have a fourth estate anymore just power’s marketing machine, fronted by people doing the violence of propaganda, but with nice middle-class, dinner-party mannerisms.
At the end of WWII the allies executed William Joyce, Julius Streicher and others for doing pretty much what our media professionals do now!
I was astonished to be pointed in the direction of this discussion thread, on Mumsnet, of all places, yesterday :
https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/4651617-to-think-that-labour-is-rotten-from-the-inside
Elsewhere, the door is creaking open, centimetre by centimetre, but it’s an agonisingly, slow process.
Don’t, even, try that bastion of censorship – The Guardian. Your comment won’t make it onto The Thread to be Moderated.
“Don’t, even, try that bastion of censorship – The Guardian. Your comment won’t make it onto The Thread to be Moderated.”
If enough people do it, they will probably have to give in just as they did about Desmond Tutu and his support for the Palestinian cause.
Yes George Peel, those Guardian moderators are kept hard at work these days! I always enjoyed reading BTL and indeed have often learnt more from Comments than actual articles. I have also had numerous perfectly polite comments on many topics moderated over the years. However, it reached a peak some weeks ago when I was repeatedly moderated and then told I would be ‘pre moderated’. Given my again polite comment was a certain politician’s behaviour at the Queen’s funeral, how very bizarre! I no longer bother commenting as, apart from a few honourable mentions, it is full of lightweight ‘clickbait’ with barely any in depth journalism. Echoing Gavin Lewis’s comments of course. I wonder what the founders of the Manchester Guardian would make of it all.
This Country’s MSM are a complete disgrace in so many areas of politics, from Palestine, Yemen, the propaganda on what has been happening in Ukraine since the 2014 Coup, the horrendous policies of this Tory Government to being totally silent on the four videos from Aljazeera.
They all worked in harmony, including the BBC to stop a Corbyn led Socialist Party, aided and abetted by the LP Rightwing MPs and the Traitors at LP Headquarters.
We cannot call the UK a Democracy anymore.
Quick Thanks to Allan Howard for his link – though I had already read it – it is good to publicise that only 2 follow-up articles have been written about this (3 articles if you include Peter Hitchens briefly mentioning Jenny Mason).
These do seem like tick-box exercises – the Independent is not allowing reflections on these neoliberal corruptions of Labour on its Letters Page.
It is interesting that Media Propagandist now treat as normal Blairites doing the absolute opposite to Attlee, Wilson, Callaghan governments and everything the Labour Party was founded to achieve. While Labour traditionalists ala Corbyn et al are somehow entryist extremists.
To be clear, ‘opposite’ refers to policies which take monies from the General Public and public commons and redistribute to the super-rich. See link – The Left’s Right Turn: Behind the media myth of neoliberal Blairite social ‘achievements’
https://arena.org.au/the-lefts-right-turn/
‘Why is there no coverage of Al Jazeera’s “The Lobby”?’
Well, there WAS Gavin, but only in respect of Alan Duncan of course. And needless to say – given that he himself was a target because of his criticisms of the Israel state regards the Palestinians – Duncan knows full well that the A/S black op smear campaign against Jeremy Corbyn and the left was precisely THAT (as do all Tory MPs and every other MP etc in Parliament) – ie a black op smear campaign – and if JC was a ‘moderate’ and a capitalist, then he – like Duncan – would have been defended against any attacks by the Israel lobby. But because he’s a socialist…..
Anyway, here’s a short clip from a Declassified UK article by Matt Kennard from last year:
On the same day, Duncan spoke on the phone to Mark Regev, then Israel’s ambassador to Britain. According to Duncan, Regev told him Masot is a “local hire, works in a junior capacity and does not have diplomatic status”.
“It’s all total bollocks,” Duncan wrote. “Masot is a First or Second Secretary, a member of military intelligence, employed specifically as a parliamentary and undercover propagandist.”
He continued: “What on earth is the point of Regev stating something that is so blatantly untrue, and about which we both hold the facts? What a muppet.”
https://declassifieduk.org/former-british-minister-the-israelis-think-they-control-the-foreign-office-and-they-do/
And Frank Dallas sums it all up perfectly in his post in respect of an article by Asa Winstanley:
What Duncan has revealed about his own case makes it beyond belief that the claims of “institutional anti-Semitism” in Labour were not motivated in the same way.
https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/asa-winstanley/high-level-israel-lobby-interference-british-politics-says-ex-minister
I was disappointed that Peter Oborne having made excellent contributions the Al Jazeera investigation is now forgiving of Keir Starmer’s actions In pursuance of ‘the greater good’ by refusing to address injustices (suspension/expulsion) meted out on guiltless members based on ‘evidence’, verifiable as lies, without redress: time to move on! It’s not the basis in my view for any democratic and just form of government. We have got to be seen to be ethically better than successive Tory administrations. We need comprehensive change.
At the age of 82 I find myself in a twilight world where it is impossible to know what is truth. I watched the conversation between the producers of The Labour Files. It would seem the BBC Panorama documentary could only have been aired with the cooperation of many members of the Establishment in powerful positions. How did the programme get past scrutiny by the lawyers. John Ware is a known opponent of anything remotely left wing. The witnesses obviously were lying , all came from an organization specially created to oust Corbyn and thwart his programme. Why were their stories not checked thoroughly? Now that the whole carefully planned political and personal assassination of Corbyn has been debunked why is there not a word in the MSM. Some very influential people must be involved in the silence, Sooner or later the truth will come out. The same scandal involves Julian Assange. Both stories deserve to have banner headlines. Orwells’ nightmare has arrived. I used to believe such a situation would be resisted by those on the progressive left. The Labour Files and the response shows how naïve I have been.
Interesting video.
Peter Oborne, although a Conservative sees Starmer’s Stasi Labour as a viable acceptable alternative to the nightmare Tories.
It’s all relative after all.
Starmer is however not part of the solution but is part of the problem.
It’s not as if Starmer, former Director of Public Prosecutions, who never challenged the state immunity and impunity given to British State Police, British Military and British Intelligence services, all responsible for large scale murder and mayhem.
It’s not as if Starmer can somehow be unaware of what Evans and Mandelson are up to, pulling the strings from behind the scenes to shut down Labour party Socialists, The Left and any support and influence The Left and Palestine Solidarity has within the party.
The Labour party Machine, the party ‘thought police’ are systematically blocking Left wingers from being selected as parliamentary candidates (Emma Dent Coad, Maurice Mcleod) ,de- selecting Left Mp’s (Sam Tarry with Apsana Begum, Ian Byrne and others in their sights), rigging the systems as it suits their purposes, smearing party members by any and every means possible, shutting down debate and democracy by hook and by crook,closing down party branches, continuing to expel many many party members without any due process and so it goes on .
You do have to wonder what Starmer’s Labour will do if they ever get into Government given what they do internally to there own party mp’s, councillors and members,ruthlessly abusing and mis-using their so called ‘democratic’ party laws, rules and processes all supposedly in the name of party discipline and winning power etc etc..