J’Accuse. Will a Conspiracy of Anti-Israel Media Bias Be Proven in a French Court?

Later this week a French court is supposed to view the entire 27 minute video of the alleged Muhammed Dura affair. The France 2 network broadcast less than a minute of the September 2000 shooting incident in Gaza, blaming Israeli soldiers for the murder of the child. The film clip was sent out to the entire world and enflamed the Arab world, escalated the Intifada, and sullied Israel’s reputation, perhaps irreparably.

Several brave individuals have come forward over the years, claiming that the filming was a hoax – fauxtography to use Little Green Football's term – and that the full tape shows that the incident was staged.

Historian Prof. Richard Landes, whose blog Augean Stables has chronicled the “Pallywood” forgeries, posted an important article on Pajamas Media yesterday. Landes writes that the al Dura case provides evidence that Western journalists knowingly broadcast film footage that is staged.

Indeed, as reported by BBC News last week, even the Palestinians are ready for the court concluding that the shooting was staged. Look at this rationalization:
For most Palestinians, “the Muhammad al-Dura case is closed. ‘The majority of Palestinians would not believe the court if they said the killing was fake,’ says Dr Eyad Sarraj, the head of the Gaza Community Health Program. ‘They would see it as some sort of conspiracy. All Palestinians see the Israelis as guilty in this. Even if Muhammad al-Dura was killed by a Palestinian bullet, if it hadn't been for the Israeli occupation in Gaza he would be still alive today.’”

Six years ago I discovered that BBC was also a blatant practitioner of fauxtography. This is what I wrote in the Jerusalem Post on June 22, 2001:

On May 10, 2001 at approximately 4:30 p.m. (Israel time), the BBC showed an Israeli attack on Palestinian Authority military and intelligence facilities in Gaza. Amidst the chaos, an ambulance was seen leaving a Palestinian compound. The next frame showed the ambulance arriving at hospital with a severely wounded man. The impression was clear: Israel attacks, Palestinians are hurt. The London-based newsreader, Lyse Doucet, who until recently reported from Israel, concluded, "Those are the pictures from Gaza."

But the film was edited, actually two videos spliced together, and one wasn’t even from Gaza. The paramedics wheeling the wounded into the hospital were wearing Magen David Adom uniforms complete with Star of David patches on their breast pockets. The wounded man was a foreign worker wounded by a bomb placed by Palestinian terrorists.

Immediately upon viewing the news clip I called the BBC office in Jerusalem. The receptionist requested the nature of my call, and I told her about the two film clips. “We know about it, and we’re speaking to London about it,” she hastily said and hung up.

To my knowledge, the BBC never admitted or apologized for the journalistic sin.

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