Panorama’s blurry vision on Free Gaza flotilla attack
Those tuning in to Monday night’s Panorama on BBC may have finished the episode under the impression that a Turkish ship had attacked a group of Israeli pleasure boaters somewhere off the coast of Tel Aviv. In fact, it was meant to be an exposé on the Israeli military’s deadly attack on a civilian vessel flying under a Turkish flag in international waters carrying an international crew and passengers and aid shipments bound to Gaza in an attempt to break a siege there that defies international law. See how easy that was? The show’s lead reporter, Jane Corbin wasn’t able to actually explore that in any depth the entire half-hour slot she had.
Corbin is a member of the Panorama documentary team and a self-styled “renowned expert on the al-Qaeda network and Islamist threat” that faces us all. I know this because it’s how she advertises herself. She even wrote a book on it.
Corbin ostensibly set out in Monday’s docu-drama to answer the question of what happened on the ship Mavi Marmara that led to the deaths of nine of its passengers by the guns of the Israeli commandos that stormed it. Spoiler alert: After a half an hour, the viewer is none the wiser. 80% of the program was devoted to commandos who killed 9 civilians while, at the most, 20% was devoted to all other comments. Her lengthy, fawning interviews with Israeli Navy flacks and TV-approved commandos failed to provide a definitive answer. The scant time dedicated to eye witnesses who had been aboard the Mavi Marmara on the night of May 31 also apparently failed to suit her narrative of choice. As a result, what we the TV audience received was pure propaganda. 
Every year the international financial system kills more people than World War II, but at least Hitler was mad, you know.
