News Embargos- Why and How?

This press release is embargoed until 2230 hours on Thursday 6 October. Before that time it is only available through the link which you have been sent.

President George W. Bush told Palestinian ministers that God had told him to invade Afghanistan and Iraq - and create a Palestinian State, a new BBC series reveals.

In Elusive Peace: Israel and the Arabs, a major three-part series on BBC TWO (at 9.00pm on Monday 10, Monday 17 and Monday 24 October), Abu Mazen, Palestinian Prime Minister, and Nabil Shaath, his Foreign Minister, describe their first meeting with President Bush in June 2003.

Nabil Shaath says: "President Bush said to all of us: 'I'm driven with a mission from God. God would tell me, "George, go and fight those terrorists in Afghanistan." And I did, and then God would tell me, "George, go and end the tyranny in Iraq �" And I did. And now, again, I feel God's words coming to me, "Go get the Palestinians their state and get the Israelis their security, and get peace in the Middle East." And by God I'm gonna do it.'"

Abu Mazen was at the same meeting and recounts how President Bush told him: "I have a moral and religious obligation. So I will get you a Palestinian state."

The series charts the attempts to bring peace to the Middle East, from Bill Clinton's peace talks in 1999/2000 to Israel's withdrawal from Gaza last August.

Norma Percy, series producer of The 50 Years War (1998) returns, with producers Mark Anderson and Dan Edge, to tell the inside story of another seven years of crisis.

Presidents and Prime Ministers, their generals and ministers tell what happened behind closed doors as peace talks failed and the intifada exploded.

Israel and the Arabs: Elusive Peace - Mondays 10, 17 and 24 October, from 9.00 to 10.00pm on BBC TWO.

BBC shies away from Bush story

Tara Conlan
Friday October 7, 2005

BBC programme editors turned lukewarm on a claim by a BBC2 programme that George Bush believed God told him to invade Iraq and Afghanistan after a strong denial by the White House.

Just 24 hours after accusations that the corporation's news coverage was backing away from risk-taking, some of the BBC's key outlets decided not to run an exclusive story unearthed by BBC2 about the US president.

It was all the more unusual as yesterday morning the corporation sent out a press release trumpeting the exclusive in BBC2's forthcoming "major three-part" series called Israel and the Arabs: Elusive Peace.

In the programme, Palestinian minister Nabil Shaath said Mr Bush had told them during a meeting in June 2003 that God had given him a mission to invade Iraq and Afghanistan and also to create a Palestinian state.

Abu Mazen, another minister attending same meeting, said Mr Bush had told him: I have a moral and religious obligation. So I will get you a Palestinian state."

As the BBC release was embargoed until 10.30pm yesterday, it had been expected the story was being saved for the corporation to break and would first appear on BBC2's Newsnight.

Yesterday afternoon, as newspapers and other agencies began inquiring into the story, the White House refused to comment. But later in the day a spokesman, Scott McClellan, said Mr Bush had "never made such comments."

However, Mr McClellan admitted he had not been at the June 2003 meeting referred to in the BBC2 programme.

Newsnight decided not to run the story. The official reason given was that the running order was packed and included another story about Mr Bush.

Subsequently, the Today programme also decided not to cover it - except in its newspaper round-up.

However, after it appeared in most of the national newspapers, BBC Breakfast featured an item, while Radio 1, 5 Live, News 24 and BBC online also ran it.

But the BBC News website's coverage was distinctly lukewarm - running the story under the headline "White House denies Bush God claim", rather than the press release's headline of "God told me to invade Iraq, Bush tells Palestinian ministers".

One BBC source said: "The denial by the White House put some programme editors off. It probably played a big part in some of their decisions not to run the story."

The lukewarm response by other BBC outlets to a BBC News exclusive in the wake of a denial by the US government is likely to dismay the new head of television news, Peter Horrocks.

Just a few days ago he urged staff not to be afraid of being first with stories, as long as they were factually accurate.

It is perhaps inevitable that suspicions may be raised about any cautious reception to BBC stories that do not present Mr Bush in the best light following Rupert Murdoch's comments that Tony Blair had told him BBC World's coverage of Hurricane Katrina was "just full of hate for America and gloating about our troubles".

A BBC spokesman said: "The story was covered across a number of BBC outlets."

Series-produced by the respected Norma Percy, who was behind The 50 Years War, Israel and the Arabs: Elusive Peace begins on BBC2 on October 10.

God told him to?

Bloody hell, the man is more insane than previously thought. Until Bush is removed from office, the world is in a precarious situation.

People like Bush make us look bad.

People like Bush make humanity look bad, regardless of whether your an American or French or for that matter any other nation not taking direct orders from voices inside their head.

Anyone having terrible visions of "One flew over the cuckoos nest" By Ken Kelsey?