ABC hires Pro-Palestinian activist to produce anti-Israel show
What are the chances?
Of all the thousands of journalists employed by the ABC, they pick a publicly declared anti-Israel activist to produce a special on ‘Jews in Australia who oppose the War’.
The programme was called “Not in My Name” on the ABC’s religious show Compass.
The star of the programme was self-promoting anti-Israel crusader Antony Loewenstein.
He told the tale of what it’s like being a celebrity Jew who’s opposed to the War.
It won’t shock you to know Loewenstein declared Israel’s response to the Hamas attacks made him “deeply ashamed”.
The half-hour programme told of Loewenstein’s love affair with Gaza and its peace-loving people … the beauty of the place and the “horrors of what Israel is doing”.
Few would be shocked that the ABC would trot out a Jew-loathing-Jew in the middle of the War to support leftist group-think.
But that’s only part of the story.
It’s who was hired to produce this very one-sided piece that caught our eye.
Listed at the end of the ABC special was the name of the programme’s Director/Producer - Brietta Hague.
A 30 second google search on Ms Hague’s credentials and background should have alerted ABC managers to concerns about whether she was the right pick for the job.
Brietta Hague has public form as an ‘arts community’ activist.
In fact, she was a public signatory to a very prominent anti-Israel petition that received national attention when it was released.
Just days after the massacre of October 7, a collective of arty activists signed a petition calling for “an immediate stop to the genocide in Gaza”.
Notice the word “genocide”.
Nothing ambiguous about the viewpoint there .. and nothing in their vanity project about the murder and rape of Jewish civilians by Hamas just days before.
Brietta Hague’s name is listed in support.
A few years before, she signed a similar pro-Palestinian open letter, calling for more favourable reporting of the situation in Gaza.
Ms Hague is free have her views – but you’d think these might have raise a few red flags at the ABC.
Appears not.
Did anyone wonder if Ms Hague might struggle to approach the Compass project with even a semblance of an open mind or impartiality?
Nope.
Instead, the ABC allowed her to continue her activism at the taxpayer’s expense.
The Compass show was profoundly anti-Israel but worse still, it was a rolling back-handed dig at Australian Jews who’ve chosen to support the response.
Loewenstein was portrayed as a moral saint for the truth, standing up against ‘the Zionists’.
It was classic ABC; ninety percent sob story with the tiniest touch of balance.
Ms Hague’s programme offered the briefest alternate voice; a Jewish academic to challenge White-Knight Loewenstein’s simple view of the very complicated situation.
Once again, with the ABC it’s what they chose to leave out that exposes the bias.
On this occasion it’s a failure to declare a major conflict of interest.
Brietta Hague should never have been chosen as the puppet master of this kind of show.
At an absolute minimum, her situation should have been declared.
But it didn’t happen.
The ABC hired a Pro-Palestinian activist to produce anti-Israel show.
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