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Discuss this article (1 Comments)'Savage' Israel's PR nightmare
by Alexander McNabb on Wednesday, 18 April 2007
The boycott of Israeli goods announced by the British National Union of Journalists is one of the most remarkable moves I can remember in my experience of the long war of attrition that has been at the core of the turbulence and misery experienced by so many friends in the Levant.
It's not perhaps big, headline-dominating news like an Israeli pullout or a new peace agreement being reached.
But there is significance to this small news that is perhaps worth examining: the people that carried this vote represent the British Press.
Yes, the famed ‘Fourth Estate'. This is a group of people who have given over their lives to a doctrine of observation over participation: people who see their role in world affairs to be recorders and commentators.
As a journalist you write about people with guns, but you always take great care never to carry one yourself. But a boycott is a gun - it's a weapon used to force change (and has been ever since the word was originated thanks to the English landlord of that name, made unwelcome by his Irish tenants).
It takes a lot to make a journalist, any journalist, become a participant. It's throwing down the pen and taking up the sword and those who live by the pen are always the most reluctant to discard it. That they have done so, that this press has done so, must be viewed as highly significant.
The most representative body of British media opinion has come down strongly against Israel and condemned ‘the savage, pre-planned attack on Lebanon by Israel' in one of a number of motions carried during the Union's annual general meeting that relate to the Middle East. The motion to condemn was carried by a large majority, another condemned the slaughter of innocents in Gaza. The motion to boycott Israeli goods was carried by a slimmer majority of 64-54, but a majority nonetheless. The two motions were originally one, but were split during debate among the representatives.
This small news is something I personally find immensely significant. You see, these journalists (together with their colleagues from around the world) are the people who carry the pictures we see on our televisions: they are there, on the ground, observing events and reporting on what's going on. They necessarily see more of it than we do - and more than they report (I know of no journalist who is always able to tell 100% of the story, for reasons of censorship, space, editorial sense or scrupulousness).
But when they've seen enough to take a stand like this, a very public stand indeed, then you can bet your bottom dollar that someone, somewhere has got a very nasty PR problem on their hands.
Alexander McNabb is group account director at Spot On Public Relations .
READERS' COMMENTS
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McNabb on Israel
Posted by TB in Oz on Sunday 6 May 2007 at 17:50 UAE time
There's nothing representative of British opinion in a vote by the NUJ. There's not even anything representative of British journalists' opinion in a vote by the NUJ.
It's a non-binding vote by a minority group that ceased to be relevant to British culture at least 20 years ago.
The chances of any working journalist, who's seen any kind of action at first hand, being involved in this is slim to say the least.
As weapons go, this boycott is about as much use as a banana.
Rest easy, Mr McNabb.
Posted by TB in Oz on Sunday 6 May 2007 at 17:50 UAE time
There's nothing representative of British opinion in a vote by the NUJ. There's not even anything representative of British journalists' opinion in a vote by the NUJ.
It's a non-binding vote by a minority group that ceased to be relevant to British culture at least 20 years ago.
The chances of any working journalist, who's seen any kind of action at first hand, being involved in this is slim to say the least.
As weapons go, this boycott is about as much use as a banana.
Rest easy, Mr McNabb.
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