Belarus test for the Conservative government

 Mark Wallace's article in the i on Tuesday explains how our government should help those Belarussian exiles who are fighting for democracy in their home country. During the Cold War ...

...Back when exiled oppositions and expatriate dissidents from a score of nations took refuge in the West, often in London, such tactics to deny papers and disrupt citizenship were commonplace.

In reply, governments in exile began to issue their own passports, which the West then recognised, denying tyrants a veto over the lives of their critics.

Tsikhanouskaya [the wife of the leader of the opposition who is in detention] intends to do the same, and it can be just as effective. But it needs Western governments to agree to recognise the papers.

Given any opportunity to tip the scales in favour of decent people and good causes, and against the enemies of our most precious values, surely we should do so?

Prime minister Johnson was seen by many of us to be in thrall to Russian plutocrats and the finances of the Conservative party too dependent on Russian money funnelled in via a loophole in electoral legislation. Belarus is too all intents and purposes a puppet state of Putin's Russia. It will be a test of how much of a clean break is the Sunak administration with Johnson's and Truss's. One may expect president Biden to do the decent thing.

Argentine electoral stand-off

 There was no clear winner in Argentina's presidential election on Sunday. So there will be a run-off on 19th December between a rabble-rouser and a representative of the Establishment. It is unlikely that either will solve Argentina's problems of corruption and low international standing. The nation with its wealth of natural and mineral resources should be self-sufficient with some agricultural surplus to make life easier. Yet she is one of the IMF's most regular solicitor of loans.

Al-Ahli hospital: please show your working, Mr Sunak

 There was a useful statement by the PM about  the Israel-Gaza war and a debate thereon in the Commons yesterday. While it all too clearly included statements that came from Israeli Defence Force briefings, it did recover some of the ground lost to world opinion in the UK government's early response to the war that we would support Israel without qualification. 

In his statement, he said:

I also want to say a word about the tone of the debate. When things are so delicate, we all have a responsibility to take additional care in the language we use, and to operate on the basis of facts alone. The reaction to the horrific explosion at the Al-Ahli Arab Hospital was a case in point. As I indicated last week, we have taken care to look at all the evidence currently available, and I can now share our assessment with the House. On the basis of the deep knowledge and analysis of our intelligence and weapons experts, the British Government judge that the explosion was likely caused by a missile, or part of one, that was launched from within Gaza towards Israel. The misreporting of that incident had a negative effect in the region, including on a vital US diplomatic effort, and on tensions here at home. We need to learn the lessons and ensure that in future there is no rush to judgment.

There was just a suggestion of the slur that it was the BBC correspondent's initial speculation about the source of the explosion which caused a breakdown in diplomacy. Much as the quality of BBC news reporting is respected around the globe, I hardly think that the King of Jordan and the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia were hanging on to hear what Auntie believed before acting. They would have had their own reports of the explosion from several sources and drawn an immediate obvious, but almost certainly erroneous, conclusion. In any case, the BBC put the record straight and it was other news outlets that persisted in blaming the explosion on an air strike.

I would like to know the basis for the prime minister's confidence that the explosion was caused by a missile fired from somewhere in Gaza. If there was hard intelligence from US surveillance, why not say so? US use of satellites and drones is common knowledge, so there would hardly be any breach of confidentiality. Without that, and in the absence of physical evidence, we are still dealing with probabilities.

Double standards on transport costs

 Economy minister Vaughan Gething was given a hard time over the weekend about an increase in the amount paid to Transport for Wales (TfW) to preserve services and jobs in a post-Covid world. The exact amount is not stated in the Wales Online article, but simple arithmetic suggests it was just north of £42m.

Pre-Covid, the cost of 8km of dual carriageway rose to £321m, over £100m more than the original estimate. Beyond an investigation last year by Hannah Thomas of ITV Wales, I do not recall much of a fuss. Is the Heads-of-the-Valleys dualling not also a "money pit" judged by the standards of the TfW critics?

Don't feel sorry for me ..

... I can do that perfectly well for myself.

 

Conservatives are still misrepresenting the facts

Some would call it "lying", but let us be generous. After all, it has not been quite on the same scale as their previous leader but one. The impression they create is misleading, though, possibly dangerously so in some cases.

They were at it at Welsh Questions yesterday.  In his final reply, Secretary of State David TC Davies accused the Welsh government of a ban on new roads. What has in fact happened is that the criteria for new schemes have been tightened. If a proposal passes four tests which take increasing concerns into account, then the scheme can go ahead. As cyclingUK's Duncan Dollimore puts it:

Increasing road capacity, for so long the stated goal of so many schemes, will no longer be a justification in itself for building a new road; minimising carbon emissions, both from construction and use, will be a key focus.

Earlier, "Top Cat" had asserted that the money spent on reducing the default traffic speed limit from 30 mph would have been better spent on the NHS in Wales. He glossed over the probable reduction in the pressure on Accident & Emergency units as a result of reducing the severity of road accidents, a point that must have been made by Welsh Conservatives in September 2018 when they initiated a debate in Senedd on a motion to "introduce legislation so that a 20mph speed limit becomes the standard speed limit in Welsh residential areas". 

The real downright misstatement came from Dame Andrea Leadsom when she claimed that nobody had voted for the 20 mph limit in Wales. A few minutes perusal of the history would have shown her that not only did two Welsh Conservatives go to speak in favour of the proposal at a special conference in Cardiff, but also the party assented to the setting up of a task force to examine the proposal. The Senedd endorsed the task force's recommendation with an overwhelming majority. Both Labour and Plaid Cymru included a default 20 mph limit in their manifestos for the 2021 Welsh general election. If Tories had second thoughts about the reduction, that was surely the time to make a song and dance about it. 

Gaza double-think

At Business Questions yesterday, Leader of the House Penny Mordaunt agreed with Theresa Villiers in a clearly planted question that there was a rush to blame Israel for the hospital tragedy without a sound evidential basis. She went on:

It is also critical that reporters, sometimes stationed in very stressful environments, report facts as facts and that those things that are not facts—things that have not been verified or are lines to take from terrorist organisations—should not be treated as facts. The BBC does focus on these things to a very large degree, but we know that sometimes it does not get things right, as we saw recently with its code of conduct surrounding the Gary Lineker situation. I am sure that it will want to kick the tyres on this and ensure that anyone listening to a BBC outlet is being given the best possible information.

As this blog pointed out yesterday, the BBC was guiltless on the matter and has reported objectively on the al-Ahli explosion. If an early BBC bulletin jumped to the wrong conclusion, this was swiftly corrected. Other news outlets were not so scrupulous. 

Later, Bob Blackman (Harrow East) (Con) asked a question which shows where his sympathies lie:

It is understandable that, after suffering the worst terrorist atrocity in its history and the largest loss of Jewish life since the holocaust, the state of Israel will now seek to eliminate the threat of Hamas and all the other terrorist organisations. Mr Speaker enabled a statement on Monday and then an urgent question. Rather than a statement, would it not be better for the House to have a debate, in Government time and on a Government motion, so that it can express its support for the state of Israel and we can come to a ready conclusion to send a strong signal? Does the Leader of the House agree that there can be no equivalence between the Hamas terrorists, who kill, maim and torture civilians and try to eliminate as many Jews as they possibly can, and the Israel Defence Forces, which seeks to target terrorists and minimise civilian casualties?

Penny Mordaunt

I think that many Members of this House would want further opportunities to discuss this very important matter, so I suggest to my hon. Friend that he pursues the idea of a debate.

There has been discussion over the last week of proportionality, and the term “collective punishment” has been used on the Floor of the House. It is incredibly important that we recognise that the International Committee of the Red Cross principle of proportionality does not mean an eye for an eye, as some have suggested. That would be perverse. We do not suggest via that very important principle that, if the Israel Defence Forces raided Gaza and beheaded a precise number of infants or burned a precise number of families or raped a precise number of women and girls, that would be okay—of course not. That is not what proportionality means. The principle of proportionality seeks to limit damage caused by military operations by requiring that the effects of the means and methods of warfare must not be disproportionate to the military advantage sought.

What Israel is trying to do is end Hamas, a terror organisation that is a block to peace. The IDF is a trained military force that is subject to the rules of armed conflict and international law. Its soldiers are trained in these ethical matters. Its targeting doctrine and analysis of it is in the public domain and subject to scrutiny.

That ethical training would presumably have been given to the Israeli soldier, the sole source  of the story of the decapitated babies, told to a TV interviewer, an untruth which went half-way round the world before it was exposed and disowned by the Israeli authorities. 

As to lex talionis, America's PBS reports that since the war began 3,478 Palestinians have been killed (Hamas Ministry of Health figures; it is not clear whether the figure includes casualties in the West Bank enclave) and over 1,400 in Israel. Draw your own conclusions.

Print the legend

 If truth is the first casualty of war, then speculation must be its bouncing first-born. When a devastating, lethal fire broke out last Tuesday evening in the Anglican-owned al-Ahli Arab hospital in Gaza City, most leapt to the conclusion that it was the result of an Israeli air strike. After all, Israel had been bombing residential areas of the Gaza strip for days. Israel Defence Force chiefs had ordered the evacuation south of all buildings in the city, including specifically its hospital. Israel's immediate denials were weighed against her record of deceit. Foremost in this was the accusation that Islamist militants had killed the Christian TV journalist, Shireen Abu Akleh, a lie which Israeli leaders maintained until hard evidence emerged that the fatal bullet came from the rifle of an Israeli sniper.

However, BBC Verify was able to piece together evidence, not just from Israeli sources (BBC is rigorous in not basing its reports on single sources), that the fireball was unlikely to have resulted from a bomb drop or missile strike, since there was no significant crater. The colossal fire damage was consistent with the spread of burning rocket propellant augmented by the fuel in cars parked in the hospital grounds. Israel's assertion that a rocket launched from a nearby Palestine Islamic Jihad site had failed seemed plausible. This was backed up by President Biden, relying on evidence from US security services - presumably stills and/or videos from satellite surveillance.

In the face of this uncertainty, Al-Jazeera TV's continued reporting as fact that the hospital disaster was the result of an Israeli air strike is perverse and certainly a fall from its generally high standards of news reporting. (Its online journalism has been more nuanced.) Could this blatant bias be the result of political interference by the Qatari owners of the news organisation? Generally, the Emir has been commendably hands-off. Al-Jazeera was even able to broadcast a documentary on the harsh conditions experienced by expatriates working on the football world cup stadiums - though admittedly it did not receive many airings. Perhaps the explanation is the presence in Doha of Hamas leaders and their personal relationship with the Emir.

If, as seems possible, fragments of whatever munition initiated the al-Ahli explosion are found and examined by independent experts then the true origin may be determined. Whatever, the outcome, Israel still does not come out of this well. Those hundreds of Palestinians killed or injured in the explosion would not have been taking shelter within the confines of the hospital if they had not already been, or feared they would be, bombed out of their homes by the Israeli Air Force. Nor, to be even-handed, does the body responsible for establishing a rocket launch site within a crowded city.

BBC does not lie, but it does not tell the full story

 I am in good company in complaining that the BBC does not inform or educate to the extent that Reith anticipated. One must except World Service Radio and the News channel's Context, but the main TV news bulletins tend to have a tabloid agenda, reporting only the most dramatic items of foreign news. To be fair, once the current Hamas-Israel war started, BBC News has been even-handed and stuck to its policy of not stating as fact any report which has not been independently verified. Thus it did not fall for the discredited story of the bodies of decapitated babies being found in the wake of the kibbutz attacks, though sadly it briefly took in the US president. 

But the lower-level of violence in the region and the breaches of UN resolutions which have been going on day by day remained unreported. As Patrick Cockburn wrote around Christmas last year:

If a prize was to be awarded for the most important yet least reported story in the media in 2022, it might well go to the news outlets that failed to report on the escalating violence between Israelis and Palestinians, which is now combining with the likely impact of the incoming far-right government in Israel.

As a result, the al-Qassam brigades attack last week came as a surprise to most casual consumers of broadcast news.