How the BBC Spreads Lies: How to read propaganda

by Eric Zuesse

Propaganda frequently masquerades as ‘news’. A ‘news’ narrative’s relevant background needs to be understood, in order for the reader or hearer to be able to understand anything of the truth, from the propaganda, rather than be fooled by it (as the aristocracy’s managers and editors of fake ’news’-reports intend, and as they hire ‘reporters’ to convey to their audiences). The present article will therefore start with the essential background to a 25 September 2017 BBC ’news’-report from the U.N., before presenting the BBC ’news’-report itself, which utterly ignores this essential background. Such a presentation will make clear the difference between the ‘news’, and the reality:

Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein is the Crown Prince of Jordan — the first in line of succession to the throne, to come following King Abdullah II bin Al-Hussein, who presently leads Jordan. On 4 December 2003, U.S. President George W. Bush held a joint press conference with King Abdullah II bin Al-Hussein at the White House, to thank the King for his leadership of Arabs who were supporting our invasion of Iraq.

Jordan is an American vassal-nation, which, unlike the Saud family who own Saudi Arabia, is not fundamentalist Sunni (Salafist, or Wahhabist), but which is supportive of the wars by America’s masters — by the Sauds, and by Israel’s aristocrats, both of which groups are allied with America’s aristocracy but also partially control the U.S. Government — against Shia Islam, and against the leading Shia-Islam nation, which is Iran.

Ever since 1744, the Sauds have been oath-bound to conquer Shia; and, in recent decades, the Saud family view Shia-controlled Iran to be an “existential” threat: it’s either “us” or “them,” they say. Jordan is 92% Sunni, but the fundamentalist-Sunni theocracy-aristocracy that rules Saudi Arabia refuses to include religious affiliations in its census-data. However, Jordan is more subservient to America’s aristocracy, than to the Saud family. Though this is the case, the Saud family have, in recent decades, had more control over the U.S. aristocracy and Government, than the U.S. aristocracy and Government have had over the Saud family; and, so, Jordan is also strongly anti-Shia.

In any event, Jordan’s royal family are agents of the U.S. Government. On 9 December 2012, CNN reported, though only online, that the U.S. was training in Jordan, anti-Assad ‘rebels’. CNN didn’t report that those ‘rebels’ were fightng to overthrow and replace Syria’s secular, Russia-allied, and Iran-allied, Government, by a government that would be allied instead with fundamentalist-Sunni Saudi Arabia, and allied with the U.S. Government; but, at least, the CNN online-only news-report did mention, though only in passing, that the U.S. Government was training in Jordan anti-Assad ‘rebels’ (mercenaries — paid for by the Saudi Government, but armed and trained by the U.S. Government).

On 25 August 2013, the Wall Street Journal bannered “A Veteran Saudi Power Player Works To Build Support to Topple Assad: Officials inside the Central Intelligence Agency knew that Saudi Arabia was serious about toppling Syrian President Bashar al-Assad when the Saudi king named Prince Bandar bin Sultan al-Saud to lead the effort.” The WSJ report said: “Prince Bandar — for two decades one of the most influential deal makers in Washington as Saudi ambassador but who had largely disappeared from public view — is now reprising his role as a geopolitical operator. This time it is to advance the Saudi kingdom’s top foreign-policy goal, defeating Syrian President Assad and his Iranian and Hezbollah allies.” The WSJ didn’t mention: Bandar is the person who not only had donated over a million dollars of his own money to help finance Al Qaeda during the lead-up to 9/11, but he and his wife were also, in the months immediately before the attacks, paying at least tens of thousands of dollars directly to the Saudi Embassy personnel who were funding (paying rent and pilot-training for) at least some of the 15 Saudi 9/11 jihadists who were among the 19 jihadists who carried out the 9/11 attacks.

The WSJ report did, however, say “Jordan denied any training or arming of Syrian rebels was taking place in the country.” The WSJ reported this while also reporting that, “intelligence agents from Saudi Arabia, the U.S., Jordan and other allied states are working at a secret joint operations center in Jordan to train and arm handpicked Syrian rebels, according to current and former U.S. and Middle Eastern officials.” Furthermore: “Prince Bandar sent his younger half-brother and then-deputy national-security adviser, Salman bin Sultan, to oversee the operation in Jordan.” John McCain and David Petraeus were reported to be especially gung-ho on the Bandar-Salman plan.

On 26 June 2016, the New York Times reported that, “Weapons shipped into Jordan by the Central Intelligence Agency and Saudi Arabia intended for Syrian rebels have been systematically stolen by Jordanian intelligence operatives and sold to arms merchants on the black market, according to American and Jordanian officials.” When underlings know that the people at the top are crooks, they join into doing it for themselves.

Whereas the Sauds’ and Israel’s main focus is on conquering Iran, the U.S. aristocracy’s main focus is on conquering Russia; but the entire Saud-Israel-U.S. alliance of aristocracies is simultaneously anti-Shia and anti-Russian. While the three aristocracies have different priorities, they are all in this together. And Jordan is allied with them; it is overtly allied with the Sauds and the U.S., and even has a peace treaty with Israel. Furthermore, Jordan also votes at the U.N. for the U.S. and its allies, and against Russia and its allies. It’s not just increasing war between Sunnis and Shia; it is also increasing war between U.S. and Russia. (Very good for Lockheed Martin and the other U.S. weapons-makers who recently sold $350 billion of weaponry to the Sauds.)

In the entire Islamic world — including Jordan, Egypt, Palestine, Lebanon, Tunisia, Turkey, Pakistan, Indonesia, Senegal, Malaysia, and Nigeria (all Sunni nations) — the public that has the highest (95%) “Favorable” rating toward the leading Sunni nation, Saudi Arabia, is Pakistan, but the second-highest favorable (88%) is by the public in Jordan. This is according to Pew Global surveys, which excluded nations where Shia are dominant or at least equal: Iran, Iraq, and Syria. Pew, as an operation by the U.S. aristocracy (which blames “radical Islamic terrorism” on Iran and on Shia, not on any Sunni nation — until the Sauds themselves, in 2017, blamed Qatar in addition to Iran), wasn’t interested in reporting the opinions of Shia (who, by the way, don’t engage in terrorism except — along with Sunnis — terrorism against the Jewish-theocratic, apartheid, nation, Israel).

That’s the essential background.

Here’s the BBC’s ‘news’-report:

The BBC headlined, on 25 September 2017, “UN accuses Russia of violating human rights in Crimea”, and stated:

Russia is committing “grave human rights violations” in Crimea, according to a report by the United Nations.

The UN human rights agency says it has documented arbitrary arrests, torture and at least one extra-judicial execution in the region.

“There is an urgent need for accountability,” UN human rights chief Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein said.

Russia annexed the peninsula from Ukraine after the country’s pro-Russian leader was overthrown in 2014.

There was no immediate response from Russia to the report’s accusations.

“Grave human rights violations, such as arbitrary arrests and detentions, enforced disappearances, ill-treatment and torture, and at least one extra-judicial execution were documented,” the report says. …

It ended:

Mr Hussein accused Russia of failing to investigate alleged human rights violations.

He said: “Failure to prosecute these acts and ensure accountability has denied victims proper remedy and strengthened impunity, potentially encouraging the continued perpetration of human rights violations.”

Nowhere did it mention that “Mr Hussein” is Jordan’s Crown Prince, nor any of the other context that might suggest he could be a U.S. (and secondarily here, a Saudi and Israeli) puppet.

Perhaps if the BBC were to be asked why they had excluded even mentioning that he was part of Jordan’s ruling family (in fact, the Crown Prince), the BBC might have responded by saying that this is customary in ‘journalism’ (for example, Britain’s Telegraph, similarly, adheres to this propagandistic convention — but the Independent does not), or that U.N. rules discourage referring to any U.N. official by any title other than his U.N. one, and as “Mister,” or else “Ms.” But there still is the choice available, to be honest and forthcoming, so as not to hide from readers essential facts, in order for ‘news’ stories not to be actually mere war-propaganda (in this case, against Russia).

Crown Prince Hussein is strongly critical of Donald Trump, Geert Wilders, and other inflamatory or even racist national leaders, because the Prince is a liberal and not a conservative. But he still adheres to the basic, which is that he’s (like all of the U.S. alliance’s aristocrats are) a neoconservative, a supporter of the U.S.-British imperial system, which has been craving for over a century to conquer Russia, and still does. As a true aristocrat, “Mister” Hussein knows that public condemnation even of anyone on one’s own side, is entirely acceptable. They all know that publicizing any dissension amongst the aristocracy helps to fool the public into believing that one or the other side of the aristocracy represents the public’s interests — which belief is actually false.

Democracy is alien to them all. They don’t even acknowledge the public’s sovereignty — not anywhere. To them, the aristocracy — their aristocracy — should be controlling every land, including Catalonia, including Scotland, including Crimea — even when an independence movement (such as in Crimea) resulted from a coup which overthrew a democratically elected President for whom 75% or even 90% of the public in the seperatist region had voted, such as in Crimea and in Donbass, which broke away from Ukraine after U.S. President Barack Obama’s bloody coup overthrew the President for whom they had overwhelmingly voted and replaced him by racist-fascist leaders rabid against ethnic Russians (i.e., against people who spoke Russian, as those people did and do). When the U.S. wants to break up a country, such as Iraq or Syria, by creating a “Kurdistan” there, an independence movement is ‘good’; but, when the U.S. wants to complete a conquest of Ukraine, by forcing its most pro-Russia regions to remain under a government that’s now controlled by those regions’ enemy, an independence movement is ‘bad’. “Mister” Hussein is a flexible person: he can represent ‘both’ sides.

The U.N. has no moral authority, when it installs a person such as this U.S.-Saudi-Israeli puppet, as the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights; and the BBC has no journalistic authority, when it hides the fact. But look at how much one needs to know, in order to be able to recognize how much rot there actually is, at the very top — including at BBC, and U.N.

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Investigative historian Eric Zuesse is the author, most recently, of They’re Not Even Close: The Democratic vs. Republican Economic Records, 1910-2010, and of CHRIST’S VENTRILOQUISTS: The Event that Created Christianity.