BBC shies away from Bush story
Tara Conlan
Friday October 7, 2005
MediaGuardian.co.uk
http://tinylink.com/?oXV1P10UrK
BBC programme editors turned lukewarm on a claim by a BBC2 programme that
George Bush believed God told him to invade Iraq and Afghanistan after a
strong denial by the White House.
Just 24 hours after accusations that the corporation's news coverage was
backing away from risk-taking, some of the BBC's key outlets decided not to
run an exclusive story unearthed by BBC2 about the US president.
It was all the more unusual as yesterday morning the corporation sent out a
press release trumpeting the exclusive in BBC2's forthcoming "major
three-part" series called Israel and the Arabs: Elusive Peace.
In the programme, Palestinian minister Nabil Shaath said Mr Bush had told
them during a meeting in June 2003 that God had given him a mission to
invade Iraq and Afghanistan and also to create a Palestinian state.
Abu Mazen, another minister attending same meeting, said Mr Bush had told
him: I have a moral and religious obligation. So I will get you a
Palestinian state."
As the BBC release was embargoed until 10.30pm yesterday, it had been
expected the story was being saved for the corporation to break and would
first appear on BBC2's Newsnight.
Yesterday afternoon, as newspapers and other agencies began inquiring into
the story, the White House refused to comment. But later in the day a
spokesman, Scott McClellan, said Mr Bush had "never made such comments."
However, Mr McClellan admitted he had not been at the June 2003 meeting
referred to in the BBC2 programme.
Newsnight decided not to run the story. The official reason given was that
the running order was packed and included another story about Mr Bush.
Subsequently, the Today programme also decided not to cover it - except in
its newspaper round-up.
However, after it appeared in most of the national newspapers, BBC Breakfast
featured an item, while Radio 1, 5 Live, News 24 and BBC online also ran it.
But the BBC News website's coverage was distinctly lukewarm - running the
story under the headline "White House denies Bush God claim", rather than
the press release's headline of "God told me to invade Iraq, Bush tells
Palestinian ministers".
One BBC source said: "The denial by the White House put some programme
editors off. It probably played a big part in some of their decisions not to
run the story."
The lukewarm response by other BBC outlets to a BBC News exclusive in the
wake of a denial by the US government is likely to dismay the new head of
television news, Peter Horrocks.
Just a few days ago he urged staff not to be afraid of being first with
stories, as long as they were factually accurate.
It is perhaps inevitable that suspicions may be raised about any cautious
reception to BBC stories that do not present Mr Bush in the best light
following Rupert Murdoch's comments that Tony Blair had told him BBC World's
coverage of Hurricane Katrina was "just full of hate for America and
gloating about our troubles".
A BBC spokesman said: "The story was covered across a number of BBC
outlets."
Series-produced by the respected Norma Percy, who was behind The 50 Years
War, Israel and the Arabs: Elusive Peace begins on BBC2 on October 10.
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Scottish Socialist Party
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