Sky News boycotts Gaza appeal
Updated on 26 January 2009
Sky News will join the BBC in refusing to show a charity appeal for Gaza, it announced today.
ITV, Channel 4 and Five will all air the appeal, on behalf of charity coalition the Disasters Emergency Committee, today.
John Ryley, head of Sky News, said it had decided broadcasting an appeal for Gaza was "incompatible with our role in providing balanced and objective reporting of this continuing situation to our audiences in the UK and around the world".
"The absolute impartiality of our output is fundamental to Sky News and its journalism," he said in a statement released this morning.
"It is important to state that this decision is not a judgment on the good intentions of the appeal.
"In order to continue to serve all our audiences, we must ensure that our journalists can continue to operate effectively in difficult conditions."John Ryley, head of Sky News
"No one could fail to be touched by the human suffering on both sides of the conflict, which has been the focus of much of our own reporting in the region.
"However, the nature of an appeal is that it sets out to provoke a specific response from the viewer.
"We don't believe that broadcasting such an appeal on Sky News can be combined with the balance and context that impartial journalism aims to bring to the highly charged and continuing conflict in Gaza.
"Unlike some other UK broadcasters, Sky News is widely viewed across the Middle East.
"In order to continue to serve all our audiences, we must ensure that our journalists can continue to operate effectively in difficult conditions.
"This must remain the first priority for any news organisation."
Mark Thompson, director general of the BBC, told Radio 4's Today programme that the subject of the appeal - the human consequences of the Israeli incursion into and shelling of Gaza - was "deeply contentious".
"Why it happened, who's responsible for it, what consequences should flow from it, the issues of aid... still questions being asked about the delivery of aid and the extent to which aid will be independent of the Hamas government," he said.
"These are all issues we are going to be discussing, debating, scrutinising in our news programmes. And it's not simple.
"Political solutions are for others to resolve, but what is of major concern to us all is that many innocent people have been affected by the situation - and it is them that we seek to help."Brendan Gormley, Disasters Emergency Committee
"Of course everyone is struck by the human consequences of what's happened and we will, I promise you, continue to report that as fully and as compassionately as we can.
"But we are going to do it in a way where we can hold it up to scrutiny, it's our job as journalists."
The Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, has criticised the BBC's decision and more than 50 MPs have backed a parliamentary motion urging the corporation to screen the appeal.
The DEC, which was formed in 1963, is an umbrella organisation for 13 humanitarian charities including ActionAid, British Red Cross, Christian Aid, Oxfam and Save the Children.
In 2006, the BBC refused to back a planned DEC appeal to aid the humanitarian crisis in Lebanon, following fighting between Israel and Hezbollah, because of concerns about editorial impartiality.
Last year, the BBC initially refused to broadcast an appeal for help in the wake of the Burma cyclone, until it was sure there was a good chance of the aid getting only to the people who needed it most.
However, it aired a Darfur appeal in 2007 despite ongoing conflict in the region.
Launching the appeal last week, head of the DEC Brendan Gormley stressed that the aid agencies were non-political.
"We work on the basis of humanitarian need and there is an urgent need in Gaza today," he said. "Political solutions are for others to resolve, but what is of major concern to us all is that many innocent people have been affected by the situation - and it is them that we seek to help."
