The excruciatingly one-sided reporting of former SBS reporter now ABC Middle East correspondent Jane Hutcheon continues. For Hutcheon, Israeli anti-terror operations are best described as "Israeli soldiers…[sweeping] the city in search of activists", who presumably are being arrested for their leafletting and street theatre, ABC TV "News" (Aug. 23), while Ismail abu Shanab, the Hamas leader responsible for organising dozens of terrorist attacks in Israel was "the moderate eloquent face of Hamas" ABC TV "News" & "Lateline" (Aug. 22)

Hutcheon’s glowing interview with Palestinian spokeswoman Hanan Ashrawi was predictable, if shallow. She lauds Ashrawi for "speaking out against oppression and corruption… and for justice and peace" ABC TV "Foreign Correspondent" (Sept. 16), but fails to mention Ashrawi’s long record of support for international tyranny and attacks on Israeli civilians. She raises no questions about Ashrawi’s support for Iraq’s 1990 invasion of Kuwait and Saddam Hussein’s subsequent Scud attacks against an uninvolved Israel (including her defence of Palestinians who cheered the missiles as they flew over the West Bank), or of the 1991 coup against Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev, not to mention Ashrawi’s opposition to removing the clauses from the PLO covenant calling for Israel’s destruction.

Throughout her reporting Hutcheon seems to lack the most basic of facts, rendering her unable to challenge even the most outrageous of claims. Consequently, Ashrawi’s claim that "the Israeli Government does not have a peace plan… and has not even accepted the roadmap per se", goes unchallenged, as does Palestinian physician Mustapha Barghouti’s assertion that Israel’s "apartheid wall" is the only obstacle to peace, ("Lateline", Sept. 8).

Like the Palestinians themselves, Hutcheon’s proposed solution to Palestinian-Israeli violence is "international involvement" ("Foreign Correspondent", Sept. 16). At no stage in any report does she suggest the Palestinians themselves might bear at least partial responsibility for their destiny, or that they at least have contributed to the current round of hostilities. As expected, Ashrawi says the occupation "affects every aspect of my life", even when she’s travelling, and claims Hamas and Islamic Jihad "are not under his (Arafat’s) control", but the obvious questions about responsibility (i.e. "Dr Ashrawi, how could Israeli roadblocks affect your life when you’re abroad?") seem to be beyond Hutcheon’s scope. And Ashrawi’s claim that Hamas and Islamic Jihad "threaten [Arafat], they challenge him" might seem hard to understand, given Arafat’s repeated attempts to reach out to these groups, but again, Hutcheon fails to challenge the assertion.

The Ashrawi interview was followed two days later by an interview with Federal Treasurer Peter Costello, on a short visit to Israel and the Palestinian territories. Though Costello managed to deflect Hutcheon’s aggressive manner, her abrasive questioning almost wholly concerned with Costello’s failure to meet Arafat, belied little journalistic objectivity on the issue. She rejected Costello’s description of Palestinian terrorist attacks as "indiscriminate acts of violence", claiming that similar acts are "also occurring on the Palestinian population" ("AM" Sept. 18). No mention is made of the fact that, while Palestinians openly target Israeli civilians, including children, Israel has consistently tried to avoid civilian casualties when fighting Palestinian terrorists.