As we saw previously, pre-election reporting from the BBC’s Jerusalem-based correspondent Tom Bateman focused on simplistic portrayal of the Arab Israeli vote and the Joint Arab list in a filmed report published on the BBC News website. Bateman also produced a similarly themed audio report for the BBC World Service radio programme ‘Newshour’ (part of which was previously discussed here) in which he visited the Galilee village of Gush Halav, also known as Jish.
Presenter Paul Henley introduced the item (from 45:05 here). [emphasis in italics in the original]
Henley: “Israel will have its third election in a year on Monday; testament to deadlock in the political system, with Benjamin Netanyahu unable so far to get the majority he needs for his leading Right-wing block. But going into this election the Arab Israeli parties are claiming to be making significant ground. Our Middle East correspondent Tom Bateman reports.”
Bateman opened by describing his walk through the village with its mayor, linking a questionable statement about the weather with a widely condemned incident which took place last month.
Bateman: “These hills of northern Israel are sun-drenched even in the winter but the Arab Israeli residents here recently came under attack. […] In Jish Jewish extremists slashed hundreds of tyres and warned Arabs against assimilation. The police are investigating but have made no arrests.”
As we see, despite knowing that the police “have made no arrests”, Bateman nevertheless claimed to know the identity of the perpetrators. As for his claim that “Arabs” were “warned…against assimilation”, the graffiti concerned actually read “Jews wake up and stop assimilating” – as reported in the English language local press.
Just as inaccurate is Bateman’s blanket description of the residents of Gush Halav (Jish) as “Arab Israeli”: the majority of the village’s population are in fact Maronites.
Bateman went on to ask his host “what’s it like being an Arab Israeli?” and listeners heard Bateman paraphrase his response.
Bateman: “’We live here for better or for worse’, he says. ‘We don’t have the same rights as the others but we try to preserve our community, our heritage, our existence. And we will stay here’.”
Bateman made no effort to clarify to listeners that all Israeli citizens have the same rights regardless of ethnicity, including the right to run for public office, before going on to introduce one of the people who also appeared in his filmed report.
Bateman: “I meet Ayob Farah on the beach in Haifa – a mixed city of Arab and Jewish Israelis. He sings satire about fellow Palestinian citizens of Israel, as he prefers to be called, who will vote. He says they may only end up propping up a rival government to Mr Netanyahu that won’t help them either.”
Listeners then heard Bateman’s reference to a small part of the US ‘Peace to Prosperity’ proposal, which he failed to note had already been rejected by the leaders of both main parties before his report was aired.
He closed his report:
Bateman: “The ice cream sellers outnumber the political canvassers overlooking the Mediterranean coast here. After all, this is the third election in a year. Its ingredients have been similar to the last two. Mr Netanyahu warns that his main rival Benny Gantz will have to rely on the support of Arab parties to win. A security risk to the Jewish state, he suggests. While the Joint List of Arab parties is aiming for an increase – up to 16 MPs in the 120 seat parliament – but the sentiment for many of their supporters is likely to remain it doesn’t matter who you vote for, the government always wins.”
Once again Bateman made no effort whatsoever to inform BBC audiences worldwide which parties make up the Joint List and what kind of political views they represent – thereby denying them the ability to judge why some might perceive members of that list as “a security risk”. And yet again Bateman lumped Israel’s multi-faceted ethnic groups into the simplistic category of Arab Israelis in order to promote his own framing.
