March 27 Media Critique: "ABC: Giving Airtime to Extremists"

Things must be good for the rabid pro-Israel partisans – they are having a hard time finding “media anti-Israel bias”.

So much so that they have strayed into the dark recesses of my own ABCs (Australian Broadcasting Corporation) radio division, and visited Radio National (for US readers, its Australia’s NPR, but better), selecting the relatively obscure Religion Report as the hapless victim of one its pointless and dishonest ‘Media Critiques’.

Onto the distortions!

The charge of Zionist collaboration with the Nazis is a form of Holocaust revisionism that is barely deserving of a response

That’s as unequivocal a charge as you could ask for. It must be true, mustn’t it?

Here’s what Radio National said,

Which Israeli Prime Minister in his youth was a member of an organisation that offered to collaborate with the Nazis at the height of World War II, because of their shared racial ideology of blood and soil?

Hang on…..where’s “the charge of Zionist collaboration with the Nazis”??

Surprise, surprise, it doesn’t exist. More blatant lies from HonestReporting.

Let’s review the facts for HRs benefit. The former Israeli PM Yitzhak Shamir, was a member of Lehi – fact.
Lehi offered their services to the Nazis in the fight against the Allies in WWII – fact.

You could argue about the reasoning for the offer – while Lehi shared some ideological points with the Nazis, they primarily wanted to establish a Jewish state in Palestine and saw Great Britain as the enemy.

So, there was no charge of Nazi collaboration.

Unfortunately, it gets worse.

Next HR attack the guest, Lenni Brenner, on this edition of the Religion Report. Name-calling is a favourite. Brenner is an “extremist”. Why? HR indulge in some classic deceptions to make the point. Firstly,

The neo-Nazi right was delighted with Brenner's book….

They probably also like Readers Digest. Does this make it “extremist'?

And,

Left-wing revisionists such as Brenner do not deny that mass murder took place but seek to blame Zionist Jews for the actions of the Nazis.

Where does this come from?? Just another scurrilous assertion from HR. Brenner makes no suggestion like this in the interview or in his writings . That’s probably why HR sensibly refrain from quoting any of Brenners words to demonstrate their claims – it’s not possible.

HR then talk about “classic Holocuast deniers”, lumping Brenner in as not one of them , but like them, and then have another go at it, throwing the Iranian President in for good measure, just in case anyone hasn’t quite got the point yet,

Abusing the memory of 6 million murdered Jews is a malicious method to attack Israel and has most recently been employed by Iranian President Ahmadinejad. Why has ABC indulged an extremist like Lenni Brenner?

OK, got it, Brenner’s not exactly a Holocaust denier, but……..

I feel like I need a shower after wading through this bit of mud-slinging. HR again display their anti free-expression instincts – how dare the media air views that we disagree with.

HonestReporting - partisan, intolerant, and dishonest.