Enemies of Reason Poundshop potshots at the media moral maze.

Jesus, it was even worse than I thought

You'll remember that yesterday I was a bit concerned about the Sun's bullshit front page about Sir Alan Sugar supposedly being targeted by Muslim fanatics, which clearly implied that British Jews were in mortal danger and linked this danger to the ummah internet forum.

Well guess what? It was an even bigger crock of shit than I thought at the time, as I've now discovered thanks to Jamie's comment on yesterday's story and this bit of digging from Septicisle. I didn't have time yesterday to check what was going on, so merely voiced my scepticism as to what the Currant was saying. However, it now becomes crystal-clear that the Sun reporters not only knew that the people on the internet forum were planning a "polite" letter-writing campaign against Zionist Jews in the light of the Gaza attacks; but those journalists responsible for the story, front-page design and website deliberately lied by omission to create a demonstrably false impression of the truth, smearing moderate Muslim voices as fanatics and possibly killers. It's not rocket science to imagine why that might be.

So, to clarify. The Sun said:

On the Ummah site, “Saladin1970” asks for help compiling “a list of those who support Israel”.

after it had warned of

a deadly backlash against UK Jews

and

fanatics

and linking it with the story that

Europe was hit by anti-Semitic attacks

.

'Saladin1970' did indeed ask for a list of 'British people who support Israel', but when that's looked in the wider context of the full quote:

Asalamalykum, it seems that the time is right to compile a list of british people who support Israel
I read this post
"The names and addresses of Wealthy Zionist Jews can be found in the lists of sponsors and contributors of Zionist Charities. The names and addresses of Company Directors that work for Military Industrial Companies that support these tyrannical regimes can be found in publication like Dunn and Bradstreet"
It would be beneficial to start compiling a list so that we can write polite letters reminding them of the injustices of israel and to stop supporting israel

To clarify:

It would be beneficial to start compiling a list so that we can write polite letters reminding them of the injustices of israel and to stop supporting israel

One more time:

so that we can write polite letters

.

The Sun decided not to mention that. Sure, they may not have done it to deliberately make ordinary Muslims out to be murderous bastards, and they may merely have been trying to make the story stack up as being slightly more exciting than it was in fact, but even if that's the case, it does have the tremendously serendipitous by-product of making ordinary Muslims out to be murderous bastards. By calling them 'Islamic fanatics', for one thing.

Now you may say to me (if you're a twat), aha Vowl, come off it matey, you're just a naive fool, 'write polite letters' is just cunning code for 'go round with a petrol bomb'. And yes, there is a possibility that somehow something slightly more than what is said may have been communicated than the bare words. But on the other hand, given that that's what there, and we have no good reason to suppose otherwise, there's no good reason to suppose otherwise. And yes, some internet forums have in the past been visited by people with unpleasant views - but that's pretty much true of every internet forum ever in the history of the world ever.

Ummah have put out a press release on the subject, which is worth having a look at. Here's a snippet:

Examining the adjectives used in The Sun's article gives us an undeniable insight into their intent in publishing this piece; the words "hate", "hit list", "hate-filled", "extremists", "terrifyingly", "fanatics", and "deadly" all appear in the short article. The article mentions anti-Semitic attacks on Jews in Europe, quotes a statement from a figure in Al-Qaeda saying Muslims should attack targets wherever they can, alleges that Hamas call for the killing of Jewish children by saying Jewish people should be targeted anywhere and mentions attacks including an arson raid on a Synagogue. Discerning readers will be able to see this for what it is: a despicable attempt to paint law-abiding, Muslim peace activists - who are campaigning against Israel's actions - as criminal, murderous, anti-Semites, and terrorists. By using the language and imagery of hate and fear, they are instilling these feelings towards Muslims in the hearts and minds of their readers, and this has been an obvious feature of The Sun newspaper for many years.

Quite. Of course there are Muslims who are fanatics, but the Sun sees them even when they're not there. I wonder if they will apologise for this deliberate distortion and lying? I'm not holding my breath. Of course, if someone at the BBC had done such a thing... but then, someone at the BBC didn't, did they.

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