Guardian’s pro-Palestinian activist Harriet Sherwood manufactures the ‘news’.

Harriet Sherwood has been for a boat ride this morning. Not just any old boat ride, mind you, but one off the Gaza coast where it seems that four fishing boats, two press boats – one of which she calls “the Guardian boat” – and one NGO vessel met the Israeli navy.

Here are highlights from her Twitter feed:

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On boat heading out from Gaza port. Fishermen regularly fired on by Israeli military. Going to check

Shouldn’t there be an ‘allegedly’ or a ‘reportedly’ in the second sentence there – or has she already made her mind up?

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Getting close to 3 mile limit for fishing. Israeli gunboat speeding towards us

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Israeli gunboat circling around. Siren sounding. Machine gun mounted at rear

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IDF coming very close. Sirens. Banking hard causing a lot of backwash for our small motor boat

harrietsherwood harrietsherwood 

6 or 7 troops on bridge, all armed. We have cut our engines

Armed soldiers? Well, I never!

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Guardian boat is flying under Barcelona FC flag….

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Fishermen saying there are no fish. They want to go out another 50 metres. But that could provoke reaction. No boat willing to go first

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One fishing boat heading further out. But the guys are asking us (Guardian) to go in front for protection

Ah, in other words the Guardian is being asked to act as a human shield. Is this Harriet playing out her International Solidarity Movement fantasies?

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I’m told that the point of the IDF continually circling us is to create continuous waves and noise. Makes fishing harder

Note how she unquestioningly accepts and repeats everything she is told.

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Water canon boat maybe 200m away. Heading straight towards us. May have to put comms away forbit

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Boats being wate canoned. Veryu dangerous. The NGO boat almost went under

harrietsherwood harrietsherwood 

IDF still firing on Oliva the human rights boat. They are trying to drown it says my translator

“Firing” or spraying with water? There’s a very big difference, Harriet.

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These fishermen are strangely euphoric – singing clapping dancing on their boats. Glad simply to survive I guess

Or maybe they’re “euphoric” about having provoked an incident which will be the subject of one of Sherwood’s signature gushing reports; famously sympathetic to noble peasant fishermen just trying to make a penny or two and blindly parroting any and every story conveniently provided by her “translator” – otherwise known as a ‘fixer‘.

The ‘Olivia’ belongs to the ‘Civil Peace Service Gaza‘:  the NGO with which murdered activist Vittorio Arrigoni operated.  CPSGAZA was set up by a collection of anti-Israel activist groups including the International Solidarity Movement, Codepink, European Jews for a Just Peace (headed by Dror Feiler), ‘Free Gaza’ and the Popular Struggle Co-ordination Committee, all of which are committed to bringing about Israel’s demise.  

 These organizations are also behind the organization of the flotillas and the recent flytilla. It is not unreasonable to assume that the lack of mainstream media interest in the ‘Freedom Flotilla 2’ and the remarkably un-newsworthy end to its attempts to breach the naval embargo with the ‘Dignite al Karama’ yesterday prompted this morning’s media circus off the Gaza coast. As is well known, the flotilla organizing movements are in dire financial straits and desperately in need of donation-generating publicity.   

And so, keen volunteers for the post of ‘useful idiot’ from the international media, including the Guardian’s Jerusalem correspondent, are offered the opportunity for a ‘hands-on’ exclusive –covering events deliberately engineered by ‘peace activists’ for political ends.

We have over a decade’s experience on the issues of the presence of the foreign press influencing and provoking incidents in this region as well as their regrettable tendency to make themselves part of the story. An escapade such as the one in which Sherwood took part this morning is not about reporting the news; it is about manufacturing events in which the reporter plays a role and then subsequently publishing them. It is political activism and Harriet Sherwood’s enthusiastic co-operation with an organization dedicated to making Israel disappear indicates the manner in which she long since crossed the line between journalism and political activism.     

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That’s it from Gaza City port. I will be writing a piece for the Guardian and we have shot video. Over and out, as they say.

Oh, we know you will, Harriet. In fact by now we are so familiar with your work that we could even write it ourselves.