Twice in two days, CBC Radio’s As It Happens radio show presented one-sided anti-Israel angles in stories, continuing with an ongoing trend for the program that HonestReporting Canada has repeatedly critiqued before.

Once again, inexplicably, the program selectively chose to only feature stories and guests whose perspectives are harshly critical of Israel, and failed completely to meaningfully challenge, contextualize, or balance any of its implications with the other legitimate perspectives and sides to the story that the current conflict involves.

The first story, broadcast on November 11 — Remembrance Day — featured an interview with a Lebanese doctor working in a hospital burn unit, who shared human stories of the suffering being endured by those caught in the crossfire of the Hezbollah-Israel front of the Iranian proxy war on Israel.

Listen to the full segment below:

While this is a legitimate part of the story of any war and deserves to be shared with the public, the presentation and framing of the story was completely unfair and confusing.

Co-host Chris Howden described Israel’s counter-terrorism operations in Lebanon as “ostensibly” against Hezbollah, and quoted the Lebanese prime minister who polemicized that it actually “threaten[s] the very existence of the country.” After this brief introduction, Hezbollah was never mentioned again and no further background or discussion of their primary role in the situation was offered.

Apparently, Howden did not find it relevant or convincing that 11 months of non-stop rocket and drone attacks by an international terrorist organization targeting civilian homes – turning tens of thousands of Israelis into refugees in their own country – could be the reason that Israel is fighting inside Lebanon. Neither Howden nor co-host Nil Köksal noted the fact that Israel is specifically targeting Hezbollah’s enormous weapons stash, which they themselves chose to store in populated places like Beirut, and is warning civilians to evacuate before striking. No, instead the program found a hyperbolic and conspiratorial comment much more important to mention when framing the devastating scenes for their listeners.

As misleading and questionable as this already was, it was made worse by the fact that the program chose to focus solely on the civilian suffering on one side of the border — never mentioning that nearly 100,000 Israelis are currently displaced from their homes for more than a year due to Hezbollah’s constant assaults, dozens (including senior citizens, foreign nationals, and children) of civilians have been killed, and a majority of civilian infrastructure and homes in some towns have been damaged or destroyed.

The second story, broadcast on the November 12 edition of the program, discussed the issue of the amount of humanitarian aid that Israel is allowing into the Gaza Strip — and served as an unbelievable example of the irrational goal-post shifting and whack-a-mole game that Israel’s detractors routinely play, to grasp at straws and always find an angle from which to focus attacks on Israel regardless of the circumstances. The segment featured an interview with retired US State Department official Charles Blaha, focusing on the State Department’s recent finding that Israel was not in violation of its demands for humanitarian assistance to Gaza.

Listen to the full segment below:

One could reasonably wonder how such a finding would be positioned to criticize, not commend, Israel. But As It Happens found a way.

The entire discussion revolved around the fact that select organizations still wish to see more aid allowed in, as well as the suggestion that US military aid to Israel should be cut off.

Blaha stated that “the State Department should be ashamed” of its “unwilling[ness] to impose any real consequences … in terms of security assistance” and that the US is unjustly “giving Israel another pass.” He also noted that he is “disappointed” about this, removing any doubt as to his objectivity and where his biases lie.

It is disturbingly dishonest and irresponsible to suggest that security assistance should be denied to Israel without explaining that Israel is fighting an existential war of survival against genocidal terrorist organizations who committed an unprovoked invasion and massacre against its people and continues to hold more than 100 Israelis hostage. To fail to explain this context, and to not let listeners understand that the policy Blaha is calling for is tantamount to singling out the world’s only Jewish State to deny a right of self-defense to, is inexcusable.

But the problem went even deeper than that. As CBC itself acknowledged that same week, while Israel is indeed allowing hundreds of aid trucks per day to enter the territory, it is actually violent Palestinian gangs — sometimes including Hamas itself — who are systematically looting the majority of the aid that is being allowed in and preventing it from reaching the civilians of Gaza. To have a discussion about the humanitarian situation in Gaza that never once touches upon this or any other factor besides a cartoonishly demonized version of Israel as the evil supervillain is absurd, and eliminated any credibility the conversation would otherwise have had.

Continuously presenting stories from As It Happens that fit this same one-sided narrative and excluding those on the other side of the issue from coverage, while also consistently failing to adequately contextualize or fairly explain the issues being discussed, will not go unnoticed by many Canadians.