Brian of London here: if you thought my support for the EDL was controversial, let’s see what happens when I write a post praising Glenn Beck.
This week Glenn Beck has been back in Israel and preparing for his major event on 24th August: Restoring Courage. This time he spoke at a meeting of the Knesset Immigration, Absorption and Diaspora Affairs Committee at the invitation of committee chairman MK Danny Danon (Likud). Here are a link to Israel Today about it.
Over the last few months I became an avid watcher of Beck’s now defunct Fox News show. Despite it’s mildly inconvenient timing in Israel (broadcasts began at midnight) I usually DVR’d it and watched whenever I could. While many have criticised him from here to the moon, I liked both his style and, more importantly, his content. I’ve even stumped up my own cash to see what Beck does next with his GBTV initiative because it’s a very important test of whether such a scheme can work. It is a great test to see if GBTV can exist as a viewer supported network where the products are THE SHOWS that are sold to the audience instead of today’s media where YOU the viewer are the product that is sold to an advertiser.
I’ve attended events organised by the David Horowitz centre in the past and its clear that much of the ground Beck was covering in his contention that the “progressive left” has taken over large swathes of the political, education and media systems in the US comes directly from the work of David Horowitz. Beck was, to begin with, fairly light on his understanding of Islam but that has improved over time. In an earlier serious error of judgment, Beck condemned Geert Wilders but in one of his last shows he seems to have rehabilitated him somewhat by noting his eventual acquittal of hate speech charges.
But it is his treatment of Israel over the last few months that was really interesting. More than any other commentator in the US he seemed to “get it”. He saw clean through the first “aid” flotilla and it’s non-peaceful purpose. And more recently, on the Itamar massacre, he was almost alone in the US main stream media in giving the case the coverage it deserved. In the clip I’ve included at the end of this post, Beck clearly understands that the root of the problem Israel faces is not a squabble over the precise line of a future border: it’s an attack on the very existence of a Jewish country in the ancient Land of Israel.
The Israel Today article I linked to did include the following criticism:
But not everyone was 100 percent pleased with Beck.
MK Arieh Eldad (National Union) felt Beck wasn’t right-wing enough in his political assessements. In particular, Eldad was displeased that Beck said in a later interview with Israel Channel 10 News that he is not necessarily opposed to a Palestinians state.
“I’m not against a Palestinian state. I’m not here for a political solution,” Beck said in the interview. “There’s something bigger than politics here.”
Eldad retorted: “Israel belongs to the Jews. We need to end the occupation – the Muslim occupation of Israel that began 1,300 years ago.”
And I’d pretty much agree with that, but I think Glenn Beck is on the right track to learn these things. I think he is genuine in seaking out truth and I think he also understands that such a thing exists: there are not two narratives to every story, there are not different versions of history. There are facts and truths, he hasn’t learnt all of them yet, but I fully expect he’ll keep on trying to find them.
I’ve edited down a version of Beck’s address to the Knesset, I hope you enjoy a slightly fuller account of what he said than most of the media delivered.
