|
Israel Considering Taking CNN, BBC Off Air, Prefers FOX
 |
| Turner’s
comments put CNN in hot water
|
TEL
AVIV, June 23 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - Israeli
Communication Minister Reuven Rivlin said he would not object if cable
stations request to remove BBC and CNN from the basic broadcasting
package, for economic reasons or due to viewers’ requests, Israel
Radio reported Sunday, June 23.
Rivlin
said that the Israeli satellite broadcaster YES is planning to submit
a request to the Cable and Satellite TV Council to cease airing the
BBC. Rivlin told Israel Radio that if the request is submitted, BBC
officials would be called for a hearing on the matter, and his
ministry won't object to removing the station from the basic package,
and offering it only as a paid station, Israeli newspaper Ha’aretz
reported Sunday.
In
an exclusive interview with British daily newspaper, The Guardian, the
billionaire founder of CNN Ted Turner accused Israel Tuesday, June 18,
of engaging in “terrorism” against the Palestinian people.
“Aren’t
the Israelis and the Palestinians both terrorizing each other?”
Turner, vice-chairman of AOL Time Warner, which owns CNN, asked, in
comments the British daily newspaper, the Guardian, described as
threatening “to lead to a further decline in the news network’s
already poor relations with the Jewish state.”
“It
looks to me like they’re both doing it,” he added. “When the
Brits retaliated for the… Nazis bombing London by bombing Berlin ,
weren’t you both terrorizing each other?”
“The
rich and the powerful, they don’t need to resort to terrorism… The
Palestinians are fighting with human suicide bombers, that’s all
they have. The Israelis ... they’ve got one of the most powerful
military machines in the world. The Palestinians have nothing. So who
are the terrorists? I would make a case that both sides are involved
in terrorism.”
Hawkish
Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s government condemned Monday
night, June 17, Turner’s remarks, calling them “stupid,” the
Guardian reported.
The
newspaper pointed out that many Palestinians complain just as bitterly
of a pro-Israeli bias in CNN’s coverage - mocking it as the
“Zionist News Network” - as Israel complains of a pro-Palestinian
one.
An
increasingly widespread perception of bias on the part of CNN among
some Israelis and U.S. supporters of Israel has prompted several
boycotts by pressure groups, urging viewers to switch to Rupert
Murdoch’s Fox News channel, the Guardian said.
Rivlin,
who told the Israeli radio that CNN’s coverage was not balanced, is
due to meet the station’s chief news executive, Eason Jordan on
Sunday, to discuss the network's coverage of events in Israel and the
territories, the paper said.
Jordan’s
arrival in Israel comes after threats from cable and satellite
companies to replace CNN with another all-news channel, because of its
alleged biased coverage and the remarks by CNN founder Ted Turner.
The
satellite broadcaster YES decided over the week-end to give the
pro-Israeli Fox News equal time with CNN. The cable companies are also
looking into broadcasting Fox News in Israel, reported Ha’aretz.
“If
Turner had made these foolish remarks in Israel, he would have been
declared persona non grata, and we are considering what to do about
the network’s correspondents ... [Such reports] would not have been
carried by CNN’s American network because of the Jewish lobby,”
Rivlin said.
The
director of the Government Press Office, Daniel Seaman said that from
time to time the network shows a lack of sensitivity to Israeli pain
and tends to empathize with the Palestinians. “Our attempts to get
CNN to stop calling Judea and Samaria ‘the occupied territories’
have failed,” he says, citing this as an example, reported
Ha’aretz.
CNN’s
Wolf Blitzer is set to start filming a five episode program on
resistance operations that are carried out by Palestinians, reported
Israeli daily newspaper Yediot Aharanot.
The
paper also carried a report quoted officials in the Israeli foreign
ministry saying that the CNN could be considered saints next to the
BBC.
In
reporting a resistance operation the BBC angered the Jewish community
in London and the Israeli foreign ministry, reported the paper.
The
Israelis were angered because the BBC’s report was allegedly
pro-Palestinian and was in favor of the Palestinian media.
|
