Statement from ZCC President David Berkley QC about Parrs Wood High School

3 February 2012

Parrs Wood School was the subject of Geoffrey Alderman's column in today's issue of the Jewish Chronicle.

The background to the story is the publication of the School's first issue of a student magazine which included a piece about the Arab-Israel Conflict which had been written by a pupil. The magazine does not reflect the policy or teaching at the School. Nevertheless the child's contribution to the magazine contained significant inaccuracies and demonstrated a serious anti-Israel bias.

The magazine was produced under the editorship of six-formers (although the contributor was younger). Since publication of the offending article, the school and its headteacher, Mr Andrew Shakos, have received many complaints from pro-Israel activists, including myself on behalf of the ZCC. Mr Shakos has considered those complaints, responded and acknowledged that mistakes were made and has apologised and sought to make amends.

I consider that it was entirely appropriate and constructive to have had a strong public reaction to what was a very distorted and one-sided presentation of the history of the State of Israel. However some of the challenges to the publication which I have seen went far beyond what was sensible or indeed warranted and had the risk of alienating decent and fair minded educators and governors of what is in fact a good school in our city.

Most of the most strident critics, including Mr Alderman, were simply not in possession of the relevant facts and have rushed to judgment and unfairly condemned the school and its headteacher.

As might be expected Lucille Cohen, as President of the Jewish Representative Council of Greater Manchester, has played a major role in representing the concerns of the Jewish community in a most effective manner. Joy Wolfe MBE has been similarly engaged as has Raymond Solomon, in his capacity of a deputy to the Board of Deputies of British Jews. None of us are soft when in comes to combatting the delegitimisation of the State of Israel and have considerable experience in the field.

I can assure you that the situation is very much under control and there have been highly constructive discussions and mutual recognition of how this situation arose and what can now be done to prevent any recurrence.

Lucille, Joy, Raymond and I have each visited the school and met with the headteacher and the chair of the governors and held extensive discussions. We all feel that Mr Alderman's piece in the JC today is an unfair characterisation of Mr Shakos and of the school.

For those reasons I am asking our activists to refrain from engaging in further criticism of the school and its management and to allow the current dialogue between the local community representatives to continue so as to achieve what I believe will be a satisfactory resolution.

Wishing you Shabbat Shalom

David Berkley QC

President, Zionist Central Council of Greater Manchester

Israel Advocates Wanted

The Zionist Central Council is increasing its Israel advocate email database.

If you would like to be an advocate for Israel please email the ZCC at zcc.man@zen.co.uk

We will email you with information regarding events that we recommend people attend to counter, calls to action - such as writing letters to newspapers / tv programmes etc. 

Israel Advocacy - Defending Israel Against Claims Of Excessive Force

With thanks to our friends at Honest Reporting, below is  their new installment of Digital Diplomats.

With the media spotlight again focusing on the Arab-Israeli conflict as the top news story from the Middle East and around the world, the time is right to launch a new series of Digital Diplomats media-training initiatives.

Their first series of videos focused on teaching people how to be effective advocates for Israel. Feedback from the thousands who enrolled in the program convinced Honest Reporting to follow up by looking at several core issues with greater depth.

The new series will consist of slide shows that illustrate the problems and how we can all contribute to solving them. Slide shows allow Honest Reporting to present powerful information in an entertaining and visually stimulating way while giving the viewers complete control over the pace of the information. You can move backwards or forwards as you wish without losing the thread of the message.

Their first slide show examines Israel’s media image as an aggressor using excessive force against the Palestinians.

Too often, the media fails to distinguish between Palestinian aggression and Israeli self-defense. Media coverage often gives the impression that Israel initiated violence when in fact Israel was responding to a Palestinian provocation.

In the slide show, Honest Reporting identify three ways that the media makes Israel appear to be the aggressor in the conflict with the Palestinians:

1.Reporting on events out of order: News headlines often give the impression that Israel initiated violence when in reality, Israel was responding to violence against civilians initiated by Palestinian terrorists.

2.Leaving out context: The media often fails to report essential information that leaves people unable to understand the rationale behind Israel’s policy or actions.

3.Framing the news in terms of Israeli aggression: Reporters often speculate about how Israel will respond to violence, placing an aura of aggression around Israel even before Israel acts.

Honest Reporting hope that their information in their slide show will help Israel’s Digital Diplomats recognize how the media distorts the news and how to speak out against these distortions whenever they appear.

The Digital Diplomats program provides advocacy training and information to help people become effective advocates for Israel. Please share Honest Reporting's materials with anyone who could benefit from them.

Please click below to locate the slide show:

Defending Israel Against Claims Of Excessive Force