So little time, so many “militants.” I was reading this story on the BBC about Basra “militants” and then this story about Hamas “militants.” Each time Islamic inspired terrorists seek to bring death and destruction upon the innocent, the BBC trots out this “militant” euphemism. What’s the problem with using the correct word – TERRORIST? Oh I know the liberal media, including the BBC, sprint away from making any moral judgement about those scum that detonate themselves in Pizza restaurants, or at wedding parties, or even on London underground trains but all this does, in my view, is demonstrate their own innate moral relativism and cowardly failure to call things as they are.
SICK OF MILITANTS.
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David, I don’t mean to pry, but do you get these stories by just searching the BBC for ‘militant’ every few days?
There’s got to be a more efficient way than to post the same non-story with the same rant over and over again. Maybe a ‘fails to say terrorist’ count on the sidebar or something. Or you could work the other way and only post stories when the BBC breaks its own rules on the word rather than just following them. This mental equivalent of Ctrl-V does you no credit.
Funny, I’ve noticed something else both articles have in common:
“frequent confrontations between fighters and Iraqi and coalition forces.”
“militants who regularly fire mortars at the Green Zone, the huge Iraqi and American diplomatic and government compound.”
“That operation ground to a halt when the army faced considerable resistance from the militias, including the Mehdi Army”
“Three Palestinian militants have been killed and 13 Israeli soldiers wounded in clashes at an Israeli-controlled crossing-point into the Gaza Strip.”
“A Hamas leader, Sami Abu Zuhri, said the group would carry out more attacks on crossings to break Israel’s blockade of the territory.”
Apart from possibly the mortar fire on the Green Zone, all attacks on military targets. Do you think that might be significant at all?
Now I imagine you will point me to other things that those or affiliated groups have done that do constitute terrorism. So I would advise you to read this, from the Iraq article, and think about why none of the militants and now-deceased militants were named.
“But our correspondent says it is unclear whether the resistance was led by Mehdi Army fighters or so-called “independent” fighters.“
The BBC’s near-total refusal to use the words, terrorist, terrorism and terror in reporting on Islamist atrocities or even when quoting those who have used the words to describe the atrocities is at the heart of the BBC’s bias.
I would be happy to see the BBC’s misuse of the word militant exposed over and over again so that more and more people become aware of the BBC’s normalising of Islamic terror by passing it off as militancy.
A militant is someone aggressively involved in a cause, not someone who blows civilians to bits in order to sow terror for religious and/or political ends.
So Alex, you should be reserving your sarcasm for the BBC with its gross distortion of the grim facts of Islamic terror rather than those, like David Vance, who combat it.
More power to you, David. And to hell with the BBC.
perhaps the use of the word”militants”and the non use of the word “terrorist” in regard to Iraq is wide of the mark anyway.It looks increasingly like a full scale rebel army taking on the coalition and the Iraq government.Both militant and terrorist may imply that the escalting war is somehow small scale.If the worse happens ,as looks increasingly likely,both words will be irrelevant to our soldiers trying to fight their way out of a hellhole.
Would almost be a valid point if either of those stories involved any civilian casualties. As it stands, representing attacks on military targets as ‘terrorism’ would be grossly inaccurate.
Hi David
With interest I noticed this section of your latest entry:
“What’s the problem with using the correct word – TERRORIST? Oh I know the liberal media, including the BBC, sprint away from making any moral judgement about those scum that detonate themselves in Pizza restaurants, or at wedding parties, or even on London underground trains but all this does, in my view, is demonstrate their own innate moral relativism and cowardly failure to call things as they are.”
Seriously, can you please point to some sources were the people who detonated themselves in Pizza restaurants, or at wedding parties or on the London underground were called “militants” by the liberal media (your term) and not terrorist.
Seriously gunngar — are you being deliberately braindead?
How about you, instead, getting pff your metaphorical lazy fat behind (no offense) and show us examples where the BBC have used the word “terrorist” to describe terrorists who blow up Pizza restaurants. Any time in the past three years will do.
I think that’s fair don’t you? You being the one in a state of denial or BBC rapture.
BBC teletext news this evening had 10 stories under its ‘Main’ headline section. At number 10 came ‘Downing St denies 10p tax rethink’.
Under the UK news section, this story didn’t appear at all, even though every UK story ahead of it in the ‘Main’ section did, and many UK more stories not in the ‘Main’ section were worthy of inclusion in the UK section.
Burying bad news for your paymasters?
TELETEXT?
There is still Teletext?
Sorry, I’ve been out of the country for 10 years.
Next you’ll be telling me that Terry Wogan has a blog on Prestel.
In the second link (Gaza Crossing), do note the interesting switch from active to passive voice and back: Hamas militants drove in the active, then comes the actual bombing in the passive voice (nobody did it; it was just done), whereas the Israeli response is again in the active voice:
“Hamas militants drove vehicles at the Kerem Shalom crossing in heavy fog.
Explosives in at least two of the cars were detonated, and guns and mortar bombs were fired at the Israelis, who responded with gunfire.”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/7356171.stm
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Alex,
Just what planet do you live on?
The recent suicide TERRORIST attack was undertaken by Hamas in clear breach of the rules of conflict, in that the TERRORISTS used civilians as cover, used civilian transport and dressed in civilian clothes! Hamas use civilians as cover to attack Israel dressed in civilian clothes and you fail repeatedly to understand the term TERRORIST fits perfectly the modus operandi of Hamas!
Are you lying to yourself? are you thick? Are you a TERRORIST sympathiser?
The leftist posters are simply breathtaking in their double standards as they switch from vindictive arrogance to the sensitive victim in a flash?
With every post from the likes of Gunnar,Alex,Scott,Reith etc you see them switch their positions as it suits! They play the shocked victim at a stoke and yet never fail to spit out poison at the likes David Vance when it suits them!
I for one am getting sick of their slimey tricks and toffee nosed sneering.
Let me make it simple for the TERRORIST sympathisers who post here, a TERRORIST can be described as such when they break the normal laws of war and use civilians as cover to further their aims and target civilians with the aim of killing them, OK? Is that simple enough for you?
PS To all you beeboid posters, stop playing the innocent victim? We see right through it!
If Alex and co. think the behaviour of Hamas ‘operatives’ comes within the universally accepted terms of military conduct, then they should stop their prevarication and call them ‘SOLDIERS’ (and not ‘militants’ and other obfuscations). For that is exactly how the Hamas people (and the IRA before them – think: ‘volunteers’) see themselves: as soldiers of Islam, conducting jihad against kufar oppressors.
If they are soldiers, they need to dress and act like soldiers and be answerable to legitimate public authority. Otherwise, they can only be criminals, acting without authority to kill, kidnap or destroy.
Of course, if they DON’T follow the accpeted rules of conduct (which are a reflex of Just War theory), it might be because they don’t follow that infidel theory (formulated principally by St Augustine and St Thomas Aquinas) and are ‘justified’ (in their own eyes) by Sharia instead.
In which case, Alex and co. accept the rightness of Sharia warfare.
“rant” … “non-story” … the tax-funded state broadcaster is a LIAR (it’s not ‘moral relativism’ or any other such euphemism: describing common or garden murderers as ‘militants’ is simply LYING), and Mr ‘twat’ Alex doesn’t have a problem with it and whinges that people even dare to discuss it! What a loser. Or a beeboid, which comes to the same thing.
Hi Jack Bauer,
I think it is forDavid to provide evidence when he makes an assertion. Don’t you?
He has done so, time and time and time again. Do try to keep up, however great the mental effort.
Gunnar,
I have responded to your comments with a new post.
Cassandra and Libertus, you seem to have confused ‘breach of the Geneva convention’ with ‘terrorism’. Nice try shifting the goalposts though.
GUNNGAR DIM,
“I think it is forDavid to provide evidence when he makes an assertion. Don’t you?”
Err, seeing that the BBC has been rather explicit in its adopted House Style not to refer to “terrorists” but to use various euphemisms (militants, radicals, guerrillas,et al) I’d say NO he does not have to provide you with any “evidence.”
It would be a redundant and tedious exercise, if every time David Vance wishes to comment on official BBC policy he has to quote chapter and verse on an issue taken as read.
It’s up to you to provide the evidence that counters his assertion.
The floor is yours.
Alex: no, I’m not the one who’s confused, having taught ethics for some years and understanding the differences between soldiers and paramilitaries, soldiers and criminals, combatatants and non-combatants, police action and crimes etc.
The IRA bombers and gunmen (AKA ‘terrorists’) were never called ‘militants’ by the BBC, although they no doubt had many sympathisers among their ranks.
Your comment about the Geneva Convention makes no sense to me, but then I doubt if you really know what is going on in Israel/Palestine.
“Cassandra and Libertus, you seem to have confused ‘breach of the Geneva convention’ with ‘terrorism’.”
Terrorism is a breach of the Geneva Conventions.Accordingly those who wear civilian clothing during military attacks do not have the protection of the Geneva Conventions.
“I’m not the one who’s confused, having taught ethics for some years and understanding the differences between soldiers and paramilitaries, soldiers and criminals, combatatants and non-combatants, police action and crimes etc”
I’m sure you do. None of those are synonyms for ‘terrorist’ though.
“Terrorism is a breach of the Geneva Conventions.Accordingly those who wear civilian clothing during military attacks do not have the protection of the Geneva Conventions.”
But breach of the Geneva Convention is not terrorism.
My advise to all three of you is to stop trying to redefine the word to fit your agenda. Since no acts of terror were committed or attempted, not only is the BBC within its rights to avoid the word ‘terrorist’, it would have been factually wrong to apply it.
But if you do want to carry on your embarrassing game of square peg vs. round hole, the mortars into the Green Zone might be a grey area as regards hard and soft targets.
‘Advise’? I’ve been hanging around with too many Americans.
Peter — apparently this is a point that seems to escape liberals.
The fact that the Laws of War were conceived to PROTECT legal combatants and CIVILIANS by expressly distinguishing them from other illegals
And it’s an absolute fact that the illegal combatant terrorists at Club Gitmo are being held under conditions that EXCEED those demanded by the Geneva Conventions for LEGAL COMBATANTS.
Just to mention one. Their “holy book.” There is NO PROVISION that even legal combatants are entitled to their own copy of the Koran, or that non-MUslims have to handle it with gloves.
The only provision is that they should have “access” to a holy book from time to time. Yet the US bends over backwards to mollycoddle these killers and gets no praise anyway from the likes of the BBC.
So why bother? I guess because they feel they are a civilized nation.
“But breach of the Geneva Convention is not terrorism”
Terrorism is a breach of the Geneva Conventions.Please remember the plural,people might think you don’t know what you are talking about.
Terrorism is the use of terror,the instilling of fear and insecurity through violence. The violence is irrespective of any actual military advantage or significance,it is purely to gain political advantage,to make an opponent appear powerless to protect its citizens.
Another goal of terrorism is to provoke a disproportionate response,clamp down security and freedom of movement.
There are plenty of text books on asymmetrical warfare,read some.
Again with your clever little reversal. If you want to avoid the issue, I have a puzzle for you – tomatoes contain water, but containing water doesn’t make you a tomato.
That’s enough time on the ‘net, Alex – time you were revising for your AS resits.
“I have a puzzle for you – tomatoes contain water, but containing water doesn’t make you a tomato” – no, really? Does this mean you have managed to use Venn diagrams to work out why ‘banker’ doesn’t mean the same thing as ‘fool’, even though some bankers are fools? I am impressed! And at such a tender age, too! Come on, own up: did your au pair help you?
Well done N.O. You seem to have solved the riddle. Now can you tell me why proving the Hamas checkpoint attack breached the Geneva Conventions is not the same as proving it was terrorism, and why yours, Peter’s and Cassandra’s reversal is deceptive?
Alex! For the last time, switch off the computer, come down for your cocoa and get on with your prep!
“Now can you tell me why proving the Hamas checkpoint attack breached the Geneva Conventions is not the same as proving it was terrorism” – kindly point me to a post where I claimed any such thing. As far as I am concerned, they are terrorists (and the Israelis said so) regardless of the GCs.
“Again with your clever little reversal. If you want to avoid the issue, I have a puzzle for you – tomatoes contain water, but containing water doesn’t make you a tomato.”
In your case it probably does.
Not a puzzle by the way it is a syllogism.
“Now can you tell me why proving the Hamas checkpoint attack breached the Geneva Conventions is not the same as proving it was terrorism,”
It was terrorism.This isn’t a game, this is people being murdered to catch the news.It was perpetrated by terrorists out of uniform.As illegal combatants they can be shot out of hand.
Shot out of hand? You mean, like, man, the Jews are allowed to shoot murdering scum first and ask questions afterwards? You’ll give the beeboids here a heart attack, Peter, and then be sued for compo under some health & safety MacLegislation.
“the Jews are allowed to shoot murdering scum first and ask questions afterwards”?
Sounds very reasonable to me. Anyone here want a coversation with someone wearing a suicide vest? Go on, take chance? Feel lucky? Kiss goodbye to your ass?
Is there any chance of getting the BBC News Department to own up to how many Muslims they employ, directly or as contractors?
When I am overseas I tune to the BBC World Service and you would not believe the Islaam-hugging tripe they put out in order to be the Worlds Favourite News Organisation.
It makes you ashamed of the downright venality of it all.
“It was terrorism.”
Well that’s me convinced. Why didn’t you say that earlier?
“This isn’t a game, this is people being murdered to catch the news.”
Soldiers being murdered in this case. Hence not being terrorism and hence certain persons having to radically redefine terrorism to maintain their accusation of bias.
“Not a puzzle by the way it is a syllogism.”
So it is. Couldn’t remember the word. You’ll have to explain your insult though.
It was terrorism.
Hmmm, no it wasn’t, the attack was aimed deliberately at IDF forces at the border crossing with no overt intention to kill civilains.
I guess it’s fair to say that the Hamas terrorists mounted an uncharacteristic attack on armed soldiers instead of unarmed civilians.
The aim was to kill and abduct Israeli soldiers, so spreading fear and desperation among the soldiers’ loved ones in the hope that they would pressure the Israeli government to release hundreds of Palestinians terrorists for every soldier.
So yes, strictly speaking it was not a terrorist attack, just an attack carried out by terrorists to further the aims of terror.
Maybe, maybe; but they were still illegal combatants, and therefore could be quite properly shot by a court martial.
True. Or just shot, fullstop, in the course of the attack. I have no sympathy for terrorists just because they occasionally mount an attack that isn’t strictly speaking terror.
Well, yes: I was referring to those who somehow weren’t killed outright.
Just imagine the fury from the BBC if they were tried and then executed, though – “Israel kills militants illegally … a breach of the Geneva Conventions …” and other suchlike idiocies. Almost worth it just to see them squirm when proved wrong.
“Maybe, maybe; but they were still illegal combatants, and therefore could be quite properly shot by a court martial.”
Isn’t that fairly academic though, when the question is whether the BBC is right not to refer to them as ‘terrorists’?
Oops, so sorry: I forgot to ask your permission before making a slightly different point.
I am afraid there is no escape for you, David: the MillieTant
term is everywhere!
I have even heard the BBC using “Irish terrorists” and the bland, euphemistic “Islamic militants” in the SAME sentence.
That takes some doing and it speaks volumes about the BBC and where its oh-so-partial squeamishness lies.
“Oops, so sorry: I forgot to ask your permission before making a slightly different point.”
Permission granted retroactively. When I said it was academic, I meant it had little to nothing to do with the BBC, not that it wasn’t a perfectly valid point.
“I have even heard the BBC using “Irish terrorists” and the bland, euphemistic “Islamic militants” in the SAME sentence.”
Where and in what context? Were the “Irish terrorists” persons convicted of terrorism? Were the “Islamic militants” engaged in attacks on civilians or on military targets? Was one a direct quotation and one not? Was it simply a stylistic tic to avoid repetition. See, without further information we really can’t assess whether it points to bias or not.
Maybe it’s because I’ve not been out of Uni long, but I do have this perverse desire to see claims backed up with quotes and evidence and then related back to the question at the top of the page.
Won’t wash, Alex. You are trying to sneak through a supposed equivalence, militant=terrorist, by claiming that it is merely a stylistic ‘tic’.
When I was at uni, elegant variation was frowned upon; but even if it is frowned upon no longer, this one is NOT elegant variation: there is a huge difference between the terms, as we have discussed here often enough.
No cigar.
Are you trying to be a Smart Alec? Maybe you are just being an annoying tick. Go back and read the thread to find the relevant connection, if it bothers you, and then do your research in the vast BBC archive. Meanwhile, you can proceed on the working assumption that I wouldn’t be making the point if there weren’t any grounds for making it.