UPDATE 2
We tweeted our view on the Sky News “analysis” piece by Alex Rossi. To our surprise, Sky News removed its tweet (hence the embedded tweet no longer appears in the first update below).
While it is certainly welcome that this piece is no longer being promoted on Twitter, the actual article remains on the Sky News website. Why, if Sky News has recognized that the article is problematic enough to remove from Twitter, is it still online at all?
UPDATE
When we criticized Sky News for not addressing the nation state law in a proper fashion, this was not the response we expected:
Analysis: Israel’s new state law is an unapologetic move towards the establishment of an “apartheid state” but only history will reveal its legacy https://t.co/gSvVfK2xnt
— Sky News (@SkyNews) July 20, 2018
Sky News Middle East correspondent Alex Rossi offers “analysis” in the form of anti-Israel agitprop that descends to the level of promoting the Israel apartheid libel. Is this what Rossi really thinks of the country he is reporting from? Is it even possible to trust his and Sky News’ reporting as fair and impartial?
Israel’s newly passed nation state law has been the subject of some intense debate and has polarized opinion both within the Knesset and outside.
It is not HonestReporting’s intention to take a position on this law. We do, however, expect the media to report accurately on the issues, something that Sky News has failed to do through selective omission and distorted facts.
The bill enshrines Hebrew as the only official language of the state, stripping Arabic of that status…
What Sky News fails to inform its audience is that while Arabic may no longer be an official language, it still has “special” standing, and the bill states: “this clause does not harm the status given to the Arabic language before this law came into effect.”
Sky News, however, implies something far more insidious.
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Join the fight for Israel’s fair coverage in the news
Arabs living in Israel – descendants of those who stayed after many were expelled from historic Palestine in 1948…
Sky News stresses that many Arabs “were expelled” in 1948. In fact, the Palestinians left their homes in 1947-49 for a variety of reasons. Thousands of wealthy Arabs left in anticipation of a war, thousands more responded to Arab leaders’ calls to get out of the way of the advancing armies, a handful were expelled, but most simply fled to avoid being caught in the cross fire of a battle.
And what is “historic Palestine?” This phraseology could and should also include modern day Jordan, which was separated from the area of historic Palestine by the British when they created Transjordan. Clearly no Palestinians were expelled from there in 1948. Given that today’s disputed territories were also part of “historic Palestine,” is the Sky News journalist wrongly suggesting that Palestinians were expelled from those areas in 1948?
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Recent high-profile cases of Arab bedouin villages being demolished to make way for Jewish majority towns…
Does this refer to the case of of Khan al-Ahmar, which has made headlines in recent weeks? That would most likely be the first thing on many readers’ minds. This Bedouin village has not actually been demolished, having been postponed by Israel’s High Court of Justice until a hearing can take place on August 15. Only then will a ruling be issued.
Secondly, Khan al-Ahmar is located in Area C of the West Bank. Thus Sky News potentially leaves open the possibility of conflating the protests of Arab citizens of Israel with Palestinians living beyond the Green Line who aren’t part of this particular conversation. Or is Sky News referring only to the long-running issue of illegally built Bedouin structures in the Negev region of Israel? This isn’t clear and needs to be clarified.
Ultimately, there is plenty of room for debate over the merits or otherwise of the nation state law. Sky News, however, falls down by not giving a complete picture to its audience.
