Sky News and its new found anti-Israel bias

After watching Sky News this morning to try to find out about today's suicide attack in Israel I felt compelled to write the following self-explanatory letter. There has clearly been a recent change for the worse in editorial attitude at Sky, because they used to be reasonably fair and honest in their reporting. Today's report would have embarrassed even Al-Jazeera.

Sky News Editorial
British Sky Broadcasting
Grant Way
Middlesex TW7 5QD

Dear Sir/Madam,

Misleading anti-Israel reporting on today’s news

The lead story on Sky News today reported on the kidnapping of the Britons in Gaza by Palestinian gunmen. The reporter listed a number of possible reasons for the kidnapping, one of which was “Israel’s declaration of a security zone inside Northern Gaza which Israel was now shelling despite having supposedly withdrawn from there in October”. This report was misleading and sloppy on two accounts:

1. Not even the most fanatical anti-Israeli Palestinian would argue that these kidnappings were in any way connected to Israel. These, and similar kidnappings which have taken place since Israel’s withdrawal from Gaza, are the work of local Fatah gangs for political and financial extortion from the ruling Palestinian Authority.
2. Israel’s declaration of a security zone was reluctantly imposed only after weeks of unprovoked missile shelling by Palestinians from the area into Israeli towns.

This sloppy anti-Israel reporting is closely related to Sky News’ reluctance to report on the brutal and sustained terrorism being suffered by Israelis at the hands of Palestinian terrorists. If Sky had, for example, been reporting on the daily rocket attacks on Israeli towns, there might at least have been some context for the story about the security zone. But Sky has not been reporting these attacks. What is even more concerning is that Sky seems to have a policy now not to report even major suicide bombing attacks against Israelis, such as the one this morning, which killed at least three people. Any rational and honest news reporting agency would have reported that attack alongside the story from Gaza, but Sky News chose to ignore it completely. For a 24-hour news channel this seems strange to say the least, and can surely only be attributed to an anti-Israel agenda by your editorial staff.

update: Since the British media never show the faces or mention the names of Israelis killed by terrorists here is something you will not see in tomorrow's newspapers: below is Uri Binamo, 21, from Nesher who was killed in today's suicide bombing. His actions in stopping the bomber almost certainly saved dozens of lives.