For the BBC, Anti-Semitism Is Just Another Political Opinion

In recent weeks, John Ashton, a physician and public-health expert, has been a regular presence on the United Kingdom’s state-funded television station. Ashton, a member of the Labor party who has previously gotten himself into trouble for using foul language on Twitter, turns out to have a record of anti-Semitic pronouncements. Stephen Pollard writes:

Among other things, [Ashton] has compared “Zionists” to Nazis and written that “Jews” should reflect on the actions of the Israeli military. [A]fter calling Louise Ellman, [a Jewish Labor parliamentarian who resigned in response to the anti-Semitism in her party], a “vile Zionist,” he wrote: “Is it time for a human being to stand against Louise Ellman in next year’s general election?” In a message sent to Luciana Berger, [another Jewish MP who resigned from Labor for the same reason], after she highlighted the rising problem with food banks . . . in 2012, he wrote: “What about the Palestinians?”

When a prominent Jewish group wrote a letter to the BBC’s head of news, Fran Unsworth, calling these statements to her attention, and asking that Ashton’s television appearances be discontinued, she responded with a letter of her own stating that, while she understands her correspondents’ “strength of feeling about the views [they] have ascribed to Professor Ashton on Israel and Zionism,” he has not expressed such views on air. Moreover, wrote Unsworth, it would be bad policy to “ban” Ashton because of his “political views.” Pollard responds:

Anti-Semitic remarks, according to the BBC’s head of news, are merely “political views.” Yeah, some people won’t like them but, hey, others will and it’s not our job to take sides in the day-to-day cut and thrust of political views, you know. Anti-Semitism—it’s just a political choice.

The charitable explanation is that Ms. Unsworth is an idiot. . . . But I doubt very much she is an idiot. The real worry is that she knows exactly what the words she used mean and she genuinely does think that, when one of the BBC’s regular talking heads is exposed for having spouted such sentiments, he is merely expressing a political view.

Read more at Jewish Chronicle

More about: Anti-Semitism, BBC, Labor Party (UK), United Kingdom

Egypt Is Trapped by the Gaza Dilemma It Helped to Create

Feb. 14 2025

Recent satellite imagery has shown a buildup of Egyptian tanks near the Israeli border, in violation of Egypt-Israel agreements going back to the 1970s. It’s possible Cairo wants to prevent Palestinians from entering the Sinai from Gaza, or perhaps it wants to send a message to the U.S. that it will take all measures necessary to keep that from happening. But there is also a chance, however small, that it could be preparing for something more dangerous. David Wurmser examines President Abdel Fatah el-Sisi’s predicament:

Egypt’s abysmal behavior in allowing its common border with Gaza to be used for the dangerous smuggling of weapons, money, and materiel to Hamas built the problem that exploded on October 7. Hamas could arm only to the level that Egypt enabled it. Once exposed, rather than help Israel fix the problem it enabled, Egypt manufactured tensions with Israel to divert attention from its own culpability.

Now that the Trump administration is threatening to remove the population of Gaza, President Sisi is reaping the consequences of a problem he and his predecessors helped to sow. That, writes Wurmser, leaves him with a dilemma:

On one hand, Egypt fears for its regime’s survival if it accepts Trump’s plan. It would position Cairo as a participant in a second disaster, or nakba. It knows from its own history; King Farouk was overthrown in 1952 in part for his failure to prevent the first nakba in 1948. Any leader who fails to stop a second nakba, let alone participates in it, risks losing legitimacy and being seen as weak. The perception of buckling on the Palestine issue also resulted in the Egyptian president Anwar Sadat’s assassination in 1981. President Sisi risks being seen by his own population as too weak to stand up to Israel or the United States, as not upholding his manliness.

In a worst-case scenario, Wurmser argues, Sisi might decide that he’d rather fight a disastrous war with Israel and blow up his relationship with Washington than display that kind of weakness.

Read more at The Editors

More about: Egypt, Gaza War 2023