UPDATE
Following Twitter exchanges with Guardian journalists and yours and HonestReporting’s complaints to The Guardian’s readers’ editor, the headline has been changed in an updated version of the story. It certainly looks a lot “Priti-er”:
Israel has become indirectly involved in a political controversy in the UK after Cabinet member and International Development Secretary Priti Patel took a personal family vacation to Israel. Patel used part of her time meeting with various Israeli political figures, organizations and charities, including Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu.
Patel has since apologized for what appears to be a misjudgment on her part concerning convention by failing to fully disclose in advance her meetings to British diplomats and the UK Foreign Office. It is possible that a breach of the ministerial code of conduct may have occurred.
It is questionable as to whether this issue would have blown up in such a way were the country involved anywhere other than Israel. Internal struggles within the ruling Conservative Party are also undoubtedly at play.
The Guardian’s latest report however, makes a disgraceful insinuation in its headline:
Sending aid money to a foreign army?!
For The Guardian’s readership (and too many of the British public), the IDF is treated as a toxic entity. This headline is the equivalent of waving a red rag to a bull.
The Guardian reports:
Priti Patel wanted to send aid money to the Israeli army after conducting a string of secret meetings with Israeli figures including Benjamin Netanyahu, Downing Street has confirmed.
The international development secretary asked officials from her department to examine whether public money could support humanitarian operations in occupied parts of the Golan Heights.
All very cloak and dagger until you read the sixth paragraph, which casually mentions what the IDF is doing on the Golan:
Theresa May’s spokesman highlighted that the Israeli army runs a hospital for Syrian refugees, but said the UK currently provides no financial support to Israeli forces and that there would be no change in policy.
So let’s put this in some proper perspective:
- The IDF’s field hospital on the Golan Heights treats injured victims of the Syrian civil war in an amazing display of humanitarianism as shown in this recent AFP feature.
- The British politician responsible for distributing the UK’s considerable foreign aid budget, whether correctly following protocol or not, went looking for an effective way of channeling some of that aid to injured Syrians.
- That channel happened to be run by the military of a country that has strong bilateral ties with the UK.
This is certainly not the same as The Guardian’s headline implies.
The Guardian’s story concludes:
Just half an hour before Number 10 confirmed that Patel had considered giving money to the Israeli army, officials from her department declined to confirm or deny whether she had asked her officials to see if Britain could support humanitarian operations in the occupied Golan Heights area.
Instead, the department answered a question that had not been asked and released a statement which said: “Dfid [the Dept. for International Development] doesn’t provide any financial support for the Israeli army and the secretary of state agrees with our existing approach.”
So where’s the story?
The real story behind The Guardian’s latest coverage is an underhand effort to insinuate more wrongdoing on the part of Priti Patel by falsely implying Israeli military linkages.
What should the headline really say?
Please send your complaints to The Guardian’s readers’ editor – [email protected]
