National Geographic hijacked

It would appear that National Geographic, that last bastion of neutrality in an increasingly polarized world, has finally succumbed to the relentless onslaught of pro-Arab bias and propaganda (“West Bank: Lines in the Sand”, October 2002).

With his infamously tainted background, it is scarcely surprising that Andrew Cockburn would wish to disseminate his own brand of anti-Israel prejudice. But did National Geographic not see fit to curb his worst excesses by insisting on the application of at least a veneer of honesty to some of his more outrageous sentiments?

I am thinking, in particular, of Cockburn’s Middle East timeline that skips from 1967 straight through to 1978 and the Camp David process – ignoring the lethal 1973 Arab invasion of Israel. An unequivocally Arab aggression, the 1973 Yom Kippur War simply does not fit in with the doctrine according to Cockburn. Being thus inconvenient, it was expunged from the record.

National Geographic, Magazine has been well and truly hijacked. Civilised people around the world know who gave the world this wicked weapon, and we also all know its cruel effects in the air and on the ground. Now we’re witnessing it in print.