On December 19, HonestReporting Française published a critique of an appallingly biased and inaccurate episode of Enquête Exclusive broadcast on Channel M6 focusing on Jerusalem.
HR Française’s response was published within hours of the broadcast, systematically taking apart the program’s skewed content. This post went viral on Facebook reaching over 70,000 people and garnering 3,000 reactions, comments and shares. A demonstration of some 200 people took place outside the Paris offices of the French TV station on the back of the HR Française expose. Both Jews and non-Jews took part indicating support beyond just the Jewish community. HR Française’s role received credit in the French edition of The Times of Israel.
You can see more HR Française content here.
Below is the translation of the HR Française post that created such a groundswell.
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The episode of the show Enquête Exclusive broadcast on M6 on December 18 about Jerusalem and presented by Bernard de la Villardiere is full of lies and inaccuracies (to see the documentary on the M6 site, click here).
Lies:
- A historical lie:
The narrator presents the creation of the State of Israel as follows:
In 1947, to calm the tensions, the United Nations separated the region into two and Israel was born. Jordan is ceding one part of its territory, the West Bank, which is supposed to become the future Palestinian state. But in 1967, Israel waged war against its neighbors and annexed the West Bank, it was the beginning of the occupation of the Palestinian territories.
Given the number of blatant lies it is hard to know where to start:
- The West Bank was part of the Mandate on Palestine entrusted to Great Britain by the League of Nations at the San Remo Conference in 1922, with the aim of helping the Jews to “reconstitute their national home in that country.” The West Bank was therefore not ceded by the Kingdom of Jordan to create a Palestinian state.
- Israel was not born in 1947, but on 14 May 1948, following the implementation of the Partition Plan of Palestine voted on 29 November 1947. Immediately after its creation, Israel was attacked by neighboring Arab countries, but won the War of Independence.
- At the end of the war, the West Bank, which was to become part of the future Arab State created by the Partition Plan of Palestine, was annexed by the Kingdom of Jordan, which did not create a Palestinian state.
- The deceitful use of maps:
The report presents, using a series of maps dating from 1967 to 2016, the “erosion” of the Palestinian territories in the West Bank, after which the narrator concludes:
In 70 years the Palestinian territories melted like snow in the sun.
Here is the first map of the series showing the “Palestinian territories in 1967”:
And the final map of the series showing the supposed erosion of the Palestinian territories over 49 years:
But Bernard de la Villardiere is using the maps deceitfully. In 1967, the West Bank and Gaza were not “the Palestinian territories” of a Palestinian state, but two regions occupied respectively by Jordan and Egypt.
As for the final map, dated 2016 and sensible illustrate the erosion of the Palestinian territories caused by the Israelis, it actually represents the territory of the Palestinian Authority, the first independent and sovereign Palestinian entity in history , an entity created by the Oslo Accords signed by Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and the leader of the Palestine Liberation Organization Yasser Arafat in the 1990s.
It is therefore once again a LIE .
Inaccuracies:
- Chronological inaccuracy:
Bernard de la Villardière presents the situation of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in the following way:
So in September 2015, Jerusalem again caught fire in what was called the Intifada of Knives.”
This is an error as this last wave of violence began on October 1, 2015.
- The Temple did not disappear by magic:
The narrator said the following about the Second Temple:
It is this Jewish temple, which disappeared almost 2,000 years ago, which is central to the concern of Muslims.
No Monsieur de la Villardière, the Second Temple did not disappear, it was destroyed by the Romans.
- No, Sergeant Elor Azaria has not been released from prison:
The narrator says the following concerning the case of Sergeant Elor Azaria (see above)
This young soldier was authorized to leave prison.
This leads the viewer to believe that Sergeant Azaria, who has been indicted for manslaughter, has been released from prison, which is not true. In fact, he had a 48-hour furlough to visit his family for the Jewish Passover. His trial is still ongoing.
- It is not a wall of separation, but a wall of security:
The executive director of the NGO B’Tselem, Haggai El-Ad, explains to Bernard de la Villardière the following:
We built a wall around Jerusalem ten years ago to cut the road and isolate the Palestinian communities.
This is false. The wall was built to prevent Palestinian terrorists from entering Israel to commit suicide bombings during the Second Intifada.
- No, the Palestinians are not going to disappear:
The narrator makes the following outrageous claim:
The Palestinians seem condemned to disappear.
This assertion has no basis in reality, given that the Palestinian fertility rate is 4.1 children per woman and the annual population growth is 3% according to the Central Palestinian Bureau of Statistics.
If Bernard de la Villardière had taken the time to check the statistics, he would realize that his remarks are ridiculous.
In conclusion, this episode of Enquête Exclusive is extremely biased against Israel, and contains an incredible number of lies and inaccuracies. HonestReporting Française has contacted M6 to ask for a public apology.
