BBC radio marks Peres’ death with Palestinian propaganda – part one

The September 28th afternoon edition of the BBC World Service current affairs programme ‘Newshour’ was titled “Shimon Peres: The World Remembers“.peres-newshour-28-9

Starting from 54 seconds into the programme, listeners first heard a recording of the Israeli prime minister talking about the former president who had passed away just hours earlier. Presenter James Coomarasamy then read statements from various world figures and that was followed by an item from former Jerusalem correspondent Kevin Connolly and a conversation with the Israeli Education Minister Naftali Bennett.

The programme then took a different turn with presentation of reactions from the Palestinian street in Ramallah such as “he [Peres] killed many Palestinians” and “he has a lot of Palestinian blood on his hands”. After that, Coomarasamy introduced the frequent BBC guest Mustafa Barghouti who was given an unchallenged platform from which to exploit Peres’ death for the promotion of nearly four minutes of falsehoods and propaganda.

Barghouti: “The most important issue is that his name is very much related to Oslo Agreement. I know that many people see Oslo as the peace agreement that ended the conflict. In reality it wasn’t and in my opinion Oslo was a big mistake that allowed Israeli settlements to continue to be built and in a way allowed the continuation of the process of killing the two states option. I think Mr Peres probably used his intelligence to deceive the Palestinians but at the end of the day, through Oslo Agreement, he deceived the whole cause of peace. And err….”

Coomarasamy: “But he did argue for a two state solution right to the end, didn’t he?”

Barghouti: “Theoretically, but in fact he never – nor any Israeli leader – ever accepted up till now that a Palestinian state can be a sovereign one; that Palestinians can control their borders; that East Jerusalem could be a capital of the Palestinian state and that Palestinians would have their share in Jerusalem. He never accepted that. Of course his positions on the issue of refugees were very clear, like all Israelis. So saying that they accept the two state solution was never translated into a real acceptance and the question is why didn’t he push for instance for recognising the Palestinian state when you are president of Israel and in all other political positions he had before.”

Coomarasamy: “So when he’s remembered as a man of peace by Israelis and beyond, for you that is not how you’ll remember him?”

Barghouti: “I cannot deny that he’s definitely not as radical as [former PM Ariel] Sharon – that’s for sure – but I think he undermined – unfortunately I have to say that on this day – he undermined the cause of peace so much by creating a false agreement that is called Oslo Agreement. By not allowing a real agreement to take place: an agreement that would have ended occupation, would have allowed Palestinians to have this little tiny state in the West bank and Gaza Strip and that would have allowed coexistence on the base of peace and justice. Unfortunately after all these years – after 23 years of Oslo Agreement – the number of settlers have increased from one hundred and eleven thousand to more than 700 thousand. After 23 years we are witnessing the continuation of an occupation that has become 50 years: the longest occupation in modern history.”

Coomarasamy: “You don’t accept that there were forces within Israel working against him – in opposition to him; that he himself may have wanted things to be different?”

Barghouti: “No. In my opinion he had a very good chance – he and Itzhak Rabin – in ’93 to conclude an agreement; to finish the issue by allowing Palestinians to have an independent state by ending the occupation and this would have obstructed extremists like Sharon and Netanyahu today and Naftali Bennett and many others from taking over. If the cause of peace was fulfilled; if what even Israeli people who demonstrated for peace then demanded was fulfilled; if they had allowed a real agreement that would have ended the occupation we would not be in this situation today. In my opinion he was intelligent for sure. He used his smartness, his connections, to squeeze the Palestinians in an agreement that was unjust and eventually that is hurting now both Palestinians and Israelis because the situation is still there; the conflict is still there and the occupation is still there.”

Coomarasamy: “And that was Dr Mustafa Barghouti – a member of the Palestinian Legislative Council.”

At the beginning of this item, Coomarasamy told listeners “we’re going to start though by looking back at the life of Shimon Peres…”. Clearly Barghouti’s long – and entirely predictable – rant did nothing to contribute to that aim. Neither did it enhance audience understanding of the Oslo Accords or why they failed to bring an end to the conflict because Coomarasamy’s weak interjections did not include clarification of the fact that the Palestinians signed the agreements as full and willing partners or that the continuation of the process intended to lead to the formation of a Palestinian state was crippled by Palestinian terror.

The editors of this World Service programme undoubtedly knew exactly what they were going to get from Barghouti in this item and as we will see in part two of this post, they were not alone in reaching the bizarre editorial decision to provide an untimely platform for his tirade of falsehoods and propaganda.

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