NOVANEWS
by Ali Abunimah
Paid advertising by Israel Ministry of Tourism inserted into October issue of British Airways High Life magazine
On a recent flight on easyJet, my colleague David Cronin “almost vomited” when he came across a glossy feature in the in-flight magazine pinkwashing Tel Aviv as a “Liberal and hedonistic” gay-friendly destination.
Aboard a British Airways flight the other day I had a similar experience when I opened up the in-flight magazine High Life to discover a glossy multi-page insert from the Israeli Ministry of Tourism entitled “Israel, The Hidden Gems.”
By publishing this Israeli government brochure, British Airways is profiting from Israeli war crimes, violations of the Fourth Geneva Convention, and breaching UK regulations on truth in advertising.
Israel too is clearly breaching a ruling by UK advertising regulators not to mislead the UK public regarding the status of territories it occupies and has illegally annexed.
Enticing me to open it up, the cover of the brochure carried the words “Provoke Your Senses, Expand Your Horizons,” but what that immediately brought to my mind was “Provoke and Invade Your Neighbors, Expand Your Settlements.” Inside, I found an effort to market Israel as a friendly, normal and desirable cultural and touristic destination.
Hidden Gems of occupation, brutal violence, ethnic cleansing and child abuse
The insert advertised the charms of what it calls “The Old City” of Jerusalem – the part of Jerusalem violently and illegally occupied and annexed by Israel since 1967 in defiance of international law.
“One of the oldest cities in the world pulses with activity day and night and is home to residents from a myriad of cultures,” the Ministry of Tourism propaganda said.
I wondered if the “pulsing activity” it referred to included Israel’s escalating efforts to ethnically cleanse the eastern occupied Jerusalem neighborhoods of Silwan and Sheikh Jarrah of Palestinian Jerusalemites.
Do the lively cultural celebrations include the government-sponsored “Jerusalem Day” rallies in which thousands of Israeli settlers – caught on video – invade occupied Palestinian neighborhoods chanting “Death to the Arabs” and vandalizing property?
Does the “healthy dose of history” that the Israeli propaganda brochure touts include Israel’s administrative ethnic cleansing of Jerusalem babies whose crime is that they are not Jews?
And do the promised night time activities include the raids by gangs of heavily armed occupation troops to arrest terrified Palestinian children from their beds?
None of these brutal realities are listed among the “Hidden Gems” that Israel’s apartheid regime – and apparently British Airways – want us to “discover.” Instead, there are promises of a mystical “Kabbalah Experience” in Safad, and “tranquil oases” in the Negev.
Of course there is no tranquility in the Naqab (Negev) for the region’s indigenous Bedouins,30,000 of whom face imminent ethnic cleansing under Israeli government plans.
Is British Airways violating UK advertising regulations?
In breach of UK advertising rules, brochure on British Airways flights markets occupied East Jerusalem as part of “Israel”