Rachel Riley In A Spot Of Bother

The shocking scene of a lone male armed with a long blade, selecting a variety of female victims, at the Bondi Junction Westfield centre was bad enough, but worse was to come as a variety of agenda-driven pundits piled on, blaming the carnage on terrorism, which of course had to mean Scary Muslims™. After the pundits came others with their own agendas.

So after Desperate Dan Wootton and flap-mouthed bigot Julia Hartley Dooda came a singularly ill-advised intervention from Countdown numbers person Rachel Riley, who has now deleted the offending Tweet, X, or whatever Muskrat wants us to call it this week, but the Internet never forgets, and so her words can be retrieved for all to see. This, then, is her first take.

“For 6 months now, people have been out on our streets proudly calling for ‘Intifada Revolution’. If you want to know what ‘Globalise the Intifada’ looks like, see the Sydney Mall … 5 victims stabbed to death and 8 transferred to hospital, including a baby, due to one man and a knife … In the second intifada over 1,000 Israelis were murdered in restaurants, on buses and in the streets by suicide bombings, stabbings, stoning, lynching, shooting, rockets. The youngest victim was just 9 hours old … Sydney mall, multiple times over is what they’ve been proudly calling for”. This generated adverse comment.

Not least because the Bondi Junction attacker was not part of any organised campaign; he was a lone agent with a history of mental health episodes and, it appears, a problem with women. Also, Ms Riley appears to depend on her definition of the term “Intifada” being the only one, which it may not be.

In any case, she seems to have stopped and thought, or perhaps someone caused her to stop and think, with the upshot being that deletion, itself coming hard on the heels of an explanation. That brings to mind the cynical but true observation of Ronald Reagan that if you’re explaining, you’re losing.

Anyhoo, cue Ms Riley’s Take Two: “Just to clarify, my intention with this tweet was not to say this attack was caused by any ideation or to link it to Islamic extremism. At the time we did not know who the attacker was, and as such I made no reference”. Ri-i-i-ight. And there is more. Rather a lot more.

“My aim was to highlight the weekly calls for ‘intifada’ being tolerated in London and around the world, which in actuality means violence on our streets. For 6 months now, I have avoided taking the tube, or going with my kids to anywhere near the marches each Saturday, and each week we see the extremist chants on proud display with little outcry”. Do go on.

“Sadly, the type of attack seen in Sydney yesterday is exactly the kind of violence the previous intifada involved and I hope to avoid in future, but in my opinion ignoring the problem won’t make it go away. Attacks on Jews have recently become repackaged as ‘resistance’ in some circles, and we should in one voice condemn all acts of violence, whoever the perpetrators and whoever the victims”. The Bondi Junction attack misinterpreted - again.

And then came the final coda. “I am sorry if this message was misunderstood, that was not my intention”. Is she sorry if the message was not misunderstood? How about just saying sorry, full stop, no get-out clause, no conditional statement? How about stopping and thinking first, not later?

It’s not the most open of debates when Twitter/X/Whatever tells us “Accounts [Rachel Riley] follows or mentioned can reply”. Not just anyone, then. Meanwhile, “For 6 months now, I have avoided taking the tube, or going with my kids to anywhere near the marches each Saturday” means she depends on sources like Harry’s Place, rather than actually being there.

Being there, as in the thousands who make up the Jewish Bloc. On every one of those marches. The marches which result in very few arrests. Instead, she linked, deliberately or otherwise, “Intifada” to a lone man with serious issues rampaging through a shopping mall. Followed by an explanation. Followed by calls for Channel 4 to end her tenure on Countdown.

Stopping and thinking beforehand. It’s always the best way to do things.

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