The attacks launched at Israel from the Gaza strip on the 7 October 2023, were a real shock to the entire world. Within days the Israeli Defence Force began to bombard the Gaza strip, one of the most densely populated areas in the entire world. It is an area which contains many refugee camps in which there have now been three generations who have lived since their ancestors were evicted from their homes in 1948, following the creation of the state of Israel. With insufficient food production to feed the large population of the area it is also dependent on food aid provided by the United Nations and other relief organisations.

In the United Kingdom we generally understand that we live in a country in which we enjoy freedom of speech and have media which are not subject to political censorship. I was surprised that two programmes I follow regularly, Have I Got News For You and the News Quiz on Radio 4, openly acknowledged that they would not be permitted to make any comments immediately following the initial attacks from Gaza. The way in which the BBC covered the increasing slaughter in which the IDF were engaged also seemed to be extremely limited.

A few weeks after the October 7 attacks, I travelled to Spain. What really horrified me was the coverage given to the onslaught on the Gaza strip by the main Spanish news channels. Whilst the BBC would presage all coverage with the comment that foreign journalists are not allowed into Gaza - this did not stop Spanish television from showing what was taking place. On a daily basis coverage was shown of emaciated people, dressed in rags, carrying body bags of the victims of the latest Israeli missile attack. The funeral processions were left meandering down paths through the rubble of towns and cities that were being laid to waste by the IDF.

Understandable public outrage

The Spanish public are not greatly different from the public in the United Kingdom. When confronted with images such as Spanish viewers have regularly been shown they are understandably outraged at the slaughter of tens of thousands of civilians, men, women and children, by the Israeli Defence Forces. Many Spanish viewers may also have already been aware of the situation in Gaza prior to the October 7 attacks. A Spanish made documentary, "Born in Gaza", had given real insight into what it was like to live in Gaza in 2014, nine years before the attacks. When the UN Secretary General said that these attacks did not occur in a vacuum, they would have understood precisely what he meant.

The widespread public outrage with regard to what is taking place is absolutely unmistakable. There have been regular demonstrations on the streets of many Spanish cities which have been attended by tens of thousands of people. At the start of this year's Festival of San Fermin, which takes place in the Plaza del Ayuntamiento in Pamplona, an event shown throughout the world, Spanish sentiments were clear to see. A banner was passed over the heads of the crowd with the words "Destroy Israel". Many windows facing onto the square were bedecked with Palestinian flags.

If, in Britain, we were confronted with the same news, there is little doubt that people would respond in exactly the same way. The government wishes to prevent this happening and believes it can do so by controlling the way in which the main media covers the events taking place in Gaza. Unfortunately for the government, the media landscape has changed in recent years. People have access to many more media channels to get their news and increasingly people are becoming aware of the reality of what is happening. Growing numbers of people are also becoming aware that if they want to know the truth they cannot rely on mainstream media.

The damage being done to Britain

When you see a densely populated area being reduced to rubble with tens of thousands of people having been slaughtered through missile attacks and bombardments by soldiers and tanks, it seem insensitive in the extreme to talk of damage being done to Britain by what is occurring. But the way in which the British government is seeking to prevent the public from knowing what is really happening is not without its costs. With large numbers of younger people no longer feeling able to trust the mainstream media this will have an adverse impact on our democracy.

A broader impact on Britain applies throughout much of the world. In much of what is known as the Global South, many people are also able to see the blatant hypocrisy of a country which tries to garner support for its stance on Ukraine which has been subject to an invasion by Russia but which says nothing on the ethnic cleansing of Palestine of its entire population through the invasion of Israel.

The recent comment by the Israeli Prime Minister, claiming Britain to have turned into an Islamic Republic, is an attempt to deflect attention from the horror of what Israel is doing and instead to try and foment ethnic tensions within the United Kingdom. It is also aimed at playing upon comments made by leading US politicians in an attempt to play upon potential tensions between the United States and Britain. This, from a Prime Minister who is seen as leading a country described by the various political party groups who are "friends of Israel" as being one of our strongest allies.