Following are excerpts from a debate on the Jordanian JoSat TV channel on the crisis in Syria, including Muhammad As’ad Bayoudh Al-Tamimi, a Palestinian-Jordanian politician of the Umma movement, and Mahmoud Al-Bastanjani, a member of the Jordanian Ba’th Party. The debate aired on November 29, 2011 and was posted on the Internet.
It takes all of five minutes of a bad tempered exchange before the two men are at each other’s throats.
This is an article by Houriya Ahmed which first appeared in The Times
Closing down the Iranian Embassy in London is not forceful enough. After the storming of the British Embassy in Tehran by a mob of petrol-bomb-hurling hardliners, the British Government was right to move beyond impotent expressions of “outrage” and demand that Iran’s embassy staff leave the UK within 48 hours.But Britain can do more in the face of what looks like officially orchestrated violence.
There is an arm – albeit unofficial – of the Islamic republic at work here that could be punished to show British disapproval: Press TV’s London operation should be shut down.
Launched in 2007 as an “alternative” to Western media, Press TV is an English-language satellite television channel with a licence to operate in London. It is funded by, and acts as a mouthpiece for, the Iranian regime. Muslim and non-Muslim female presenters are required to wear the Islamic headscarf in front of the camera while broadcasting from London.
obviously, a great deal has been written about the riots to date and a great deal of predictable outpouring has also taken place. what i wanted to offer to this debate is, however, along more behavioural lines.
i have for some time been aware of the powerful analytical frameworks for bio-psycho-social systems developed by the american psychologist dr clare graves and systematised for practical application by don beck and chris cowan in the excellent book “spiral dynamics” (i’m not affiliated with anyone concerned, incidentally). at the risk of sounding like somewhat of a “fanboy”, as i believe it is called on teh interwebs, i am convinced it constitutes an important piece of intellectual real estate for the understanding of complex socio-political systems, particularly in behavioural terms.
The writer Dennis Potter, in his last interview before his death, on the effects of the Ruper Murdoch media empire on political discourse in Britain.
The News of the World on its last run tonight. Cheers!
This is a cross-post by Dave Rich of CST
Iran’s English-language station Press TV was censured by Ofcom this week for airing an interview with a jailed Iranian journalist which was obtained by force during his imprisonment. This is not the first time that Ofcom have ruled against Press TV, and the Iranian channel seems to be getting a bit annoyed at all the attention.
In response, Press TV have published an article on their website, written by a friend of former KKK Grand Wizard David Duke, which accuses Ofcom of being part of the plot outlined in the Protocols of the Elders of Zion. (This is not a joke).
You can read more about the author of the piece, Mark Dankof, on the JHate blog. He concludes his piece by lauding Press TV:
This is a press release from Nick Lowles at Hope Not Hate
If extremism breeds extremism it is also important to identify those who are fuelling this hatred in the first place and 73% of you told us it was the media. As a result we are launching a campaign for responsible journalism and have identified the Daily Star as our first target.
This is a cross-post from Harry’s Place
According to the Daily Mail (ho, ho ho), only one in five of you believe David Kelly committed suicide.
According to an exclusive Mail opinion poll, only one in five people accepts the Hutton Inquiry’s finding that the government weapons inspector took his own life.
The survey also reveals that eight out of ten people want a full inquest. With senior MPs making the same demand, the Coalition is under strong pressure to act.
It comes as a medical report says it was ‘impossible’ that Dr Kelly bled to death in the way described by the inquiry.
The “impossible circumstances” of Kelly’s death are described by the pathologist who examined Kelly in today’s Sunday Times (paywall) as:
“an absolute classic case of self-inflicted injury. You could illustrate a textbook with it. If it were anyone else and you were to suggest there’s something foul about it, you would be referred for additional training.”
of course, nobody should be surprised that when a natural disaster occurs, the usual suspects jump on the bandwagon to explain why it proves their wacky theologies and that G!D Is Having a good old Smite at people of whom they disapprove or, alternatively, that it’s all part of the dastardly plans of the illuminati or reptilian space overlords.
a reptilian overlord yesterday
anyway, we’ve had boobquake, gayquake and immorality-inspired flooding so, predictably, our new icelandic friend eyjafjallajökull has been pressed into surface for this purpose, proving variously that:
1. we should never have turned on that large hadron collider
2. iceland is being too tolerant of neo-paganism and europe of gay rights
3. G!D Disapproves of “obamacare”
4. people are having a go at the pope
5. aliens (or satan) are doing space paintings with ufos
This is a press release from the Quilliam Foundation
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A new report by Quilliam has found that the Islam Channel, the UK’s most watched Muslim TV channel, is sowing suspicion between different religious communities and promoting intolerance and prejudice.
The report, based on Quilliam’s recording and monitoring of the channel’s output over a three-month period, found that there were several key problematic trends in its output:
now, i haven’t seen the “dispatches” programme yet, it’s on my sky+ box waiting to be viewed. however, i was quite amused to be warned by one naeem darr, who i understand is some sort of spokesman for our old friends the muslim safety forum, to have my complaint ready. helpfully, he then went on to provide me with a set of points to complain about to channel 4 and jim kirkpatrick mp. i reproduce his email in full – and include in bold the bits which he appears to know before broadcast:
Dispatches Islamophobic documentary
Channel 4’s Dispatches is due to broadcast a damaging and misleading programme on Monday 1st March at 8pm. For nearly a year the programme had undercover reporters attending events (including private meetings) of Islamic Forum of Europe (IFE) and passing themselves off as Muslims and friends, but acting as agents provocateurs to solicit replies to use against IFE.