Editing Robert Fisk (section)

==Views==
[[File:Robert Fisk book signing at De Roma, Antwerp.jpg|alt=Photo of Fisk in Antwerp in 2015|thumb|Fisk book signing in 2015]]

===Stances and reception===
Fisk was known for his criticism of the [[foreign policy of the United States]], particularly the country's involvement in the wars in Afghanistan and the Middle East.<ref name="IT20201101" /> He was consistently critical of Israel, labelling some of the country's actions against Palestinians as "[[Israeli war crimes|war crimes]]".<ref name="BBCObit">{{cite news |publisher=[[BBC News]] |url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-54774539 |title=Robert Fisk, veteran UK journalist, dies aged 74 |date=3 November 2020}}</ref> One of his beliefs was that he should report events from the point of view of the victim rather than those in authority.<ref name="TimesObit">{{cite news |work=[[The Times]] |title=Robert Fisk obituary |date=2 November 2020 |url=https://www.thetimes.com/uk/article/robert-fisk-obituary-2c2n2n086}}</ref><ref>Pat and Samir Twair, [https://www.wrmea.org/008-december/robert-fisk-on-reporting-from-the-viewpoint-of-the-victim.html Robert Fisk on Reporting "From the Viewpoint Of the Victim"], ''[[Washington Report on Middle East Affairs]]'', December 2008. ''"A story should be told from the viewpoint of the victim whose blood is being spilled. During the time of the slave trade, I’d have interviewed the slaves, not the captain of the slave ship."''</ref> ''[[The Times]]'' newspaper, in its November 2020 obituary of Fisk, said that he had developed a "visceral dislike of the Israeli government and its allies" following his coverage of the [[Sabra and Shatila massacre]], arguing that this had made Fisk biased and "unable to provide a dispassionate account of events and their context".<ref name="TimesObit"/> [[David Pryce-Jones]], writing in ''[[The Spectator]]'' in 2003, said that Fisk was guilty of "hysteria and distortion" in his coverage of Middle Eastern topics. In contrast, ''[[The Independent]]'', for whom he wrote from 1989, praised him as being "renowned for his courage in questioning official narratives from governments".<ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/robert-fisk-obituary-died-journalist-middle-east-b1538618.html |work=[[The Independent]] |title=Robert Fisk: The outstanding and truth-telling journalist who ventured into danger |first=David |last=McKittrick |date=4 November 2020}}</ref>

The BBC's [[Jeremy Bowen]] also praised him following his death, and noted the controversy Fisk drew for his "sharp criticism of the US and Israel, and of Western foreign policy". Bowen described himself as an admirer who would miss Fisk's "guts and his appetite for the fight".<ref name="BBCObit" /> Fisk dismissed the controversy related to his reporting in Syria, saying that he was "writing only what he saw and heard".<ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2020/nov/01/robert-fisk-veteran-british-foreign-correspondent-dies-aged-74 |title=Robert Fisk, veteran British foreign correspondent, dies aged 74 |first=Clea |last=Skopeliti |date=1 November 2020 |work=[[The Guardian]]}}</ref> His ex-wife, [[Lara Marlowe]], took exception to the use of the adjective "controversial" in his obituaries, saying "he was a prolific non-conformist in the world of journalism, whose judgments avoided jumping on the bandwagon" and, in her experience, had been "intuitive, rapid [...] and invariably right".<ref>{{Cite news|last=Marlowe|first=Lara|title=Lara Marlowe: Robert Fisk, my former husband, was the finest journalist of his generation|url=https://www.irishtimes.com/life-and-style/people/lara-marlowe-robert-fisk-my-former-husband-was-the-finest-journalist-of-his-generation-1.4401075|access-date=15 November 2020|newspaper=The Irish Times}}</ref>

Similarly, the foreign correspondent for ''The Independent'' [[Patrick Cockburn]], responding to criticisms raised in obituaries, said "[[wikt:derring-do|Derring-do]] in times of war usually gets good notices from the press and from public opinion, but moral endurance is a much rarer commodity, when the plaudits are replaced by abuse, often from people who see a world divided between devils and angels and denounce anybody reporting less than angelic behaviour on the part of the latter for being secret sympathisers with the devil." Cockburn wrote that Fisk was better than anyone at "find[ing] out significant news as fast as possible, disregard[ing] all efforts by governments, armies and media to suppress it, and pass[ing] that information on to the public so they can better judge what is happening in the world around them".<ref>{{Cite news|date=13 November 2020|title=Robert Fisk had true independence of mind – which is why he angered governments |first=Patrick |last=Cockburn|url=https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/robert-fisk-iraq-reporting-governments-b1722619.html|access-date=15 November 2020|work=The Independent}}</ref>

=== On journalism and politics ===
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Fisk described himself as a [[Pacifism|pacifist]] and [[Non-voting|non-voter]].<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.independent.co.uk/news/media/press/free-podcast-download-the-lost-art-of-reportage-1818070.html |title=The lost art of reportage |work=The Independent|date=10 November 2009 |access-date=1 November 2020}}</ref> He said that journalism must "challenge authority, all authority, especially so when governments and politicians take us to war". He quoted, with approval, the words of Israeli journalist [[Amira Hass]]: "There is a misconception that journalists can be objective. ... What journalism is really about is to monitor power and the centres of power."<ref name="Miles">{{cite news|url=http://books.guardian.co.uk/reviews/politicsphilosophyandsociety/0,6121,1645908,00.html|title=The big picture|last=Miles|first=Oliver|date=19 November 2005|access-date=19 July 2006|work=[[The Guardian]]}}</ref>  In light of his earlier training as a journalist on the ''Newcastle Evening Chronicle'', he said "I had a suspicion that the language we were forced to write as trainee reporters all those years ago had somehow imprisoned us, that we had been schooled to mould the world and ourselves in clichés, that for the most part this would define our lives, destroy our anger and imagination, make us loyal to our betters, to governments, to authority. For some reason, I had become possessed of the belief that the blame for our failure as journalists to report the Middle East with any sense of moral passion or indignation lay in the way that we as journalists were trained."<ref>{{Cite news|last=Fisk|first=Robert|date=3 August 2001|title=Top hack blasts local rags|url=https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/commentators/fisk/robert-fisk-top-hack-blasts-local-rags-9196235.html|access-date=2 December 2020|work=The Independent}}</ref> In an interview with the BBC in 2005, he articulated this position further: "If you believe that victims should have more of a say than people who commit atrocities, then yes, I take a definite position. If reporters don't do that then they are out of their minds."<ref>{{Cite news|date=3 December 2005|title=Viewpoint: UK war reporter Robert Fisk|url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/4393358.stm|access-date=15 November 2020}}</ref>

On coverage of foreign reporting, he observed in a 2006 interview with Harry Kreisler of the Institute of International Studies at UC Berkeley: "the French are very good at getting to the scene and reporting the reality. I know France doesn't have a very clean reputation in American politics at the moment but my goodness, they've got good journalists. You read a translation of ''[[Libération]]'', ''[[Le Figaro|Figaro]]'', ''[[Le Monde]]'' – they've got it. I work a lot with French – I normally work on my own, but if I work with other reporters, I tend to report with Italians or the French because, my goodness, they get to the war front."<ref>{{Cite web|title=Conversation with Robert Fisk, p. 4 of 6|url=http://globetrotter.berkeley.edu/people6/Fisk/fisk-con4.html|access-date=15 November 2020|website=globetrotter.berkeley.edu}}</ref>

When he spoke on "Lies, Misreporting, and Catastrophe in the Middle East" at the [[First Congregational Church of Berkeley]] on 22 September 2010, he stated: "I think it is the duty of a foreign correspondent to be neutral and unbiased on the side of those who suffer, whoever they may be."<ref>{{cite news|last=Fisk|first=Robert|title=Robert Fisk: Terror of Power and Power of Terror|url=http://www.radioproject.org/2010/10/robert-fisk-the-terror-of-power-and-the-power-of-terror/|access-date=28 June 2011|work=Making Contact|date=12 October 2010|agency=National Radio Project}}</ref> He wrote at length on how many contemporary conflicts had their origins, in his view, in lines drawn on maps: "After the Allied victory of 1918, at the end of my father's war, the victors divided up the lands of their former enemies. In the space of just seventeen months, they created the borders of [[Northern Ireland]], [[Kingdom of Yugoslavia|Yugoslavia]] and most of the [[Middle East]]. And I have spent my entire career—in [[Belfast]] and [[Sarajevo]], in [[Beirut]] and [[Baghdad]]—watching the people within those borders burn."<ref>Robert Fisk, ''The Great War for Civilisation'', 2005</ref>

===Armenian genocide===
Fisk wrote extensively about the [[Armenian genocide]] of 1915 and supported moves to persuade the Turkish Government to acknowledge it.<ref>{{cite news|last=Fisk|first=Robert|url=https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/comment/armenian-genocide-to-continue-to-deny-the-truth-of-this-mass-human-cruelty-is-close-to-a-criminal-10188119.html|title=Armenian genocide: To continue to deny the truth of this mass human cruelty is close to a criminal lie|work=The Independent|date=20 April 2015|access-date=1 November 2020}}</ref>

===Remembrance Day===
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For [[Remembrance Day]] in 2011, Fisk wrote that his father "old Bill Fisk became very ruminative about the Great War. He learned that Haig had lied, that he himself had fought for a world that betrayed him, that 20,000 British dead on the first day of the Somme – which he mercifully avoided because his first regiment, the Cheshires, sent him to Dublin and Cork to deal with another 1916 "problem" – was a trashing of human life. In hospital and recovering from cancer, I asked him once why the Great War was fought. 'All I can tell you, fellah,' he said, 'was that it was a great waste.' And he swept his hand from left to right. Then he stopped wearing his [[Remembrance poppy|poppy]]. I asked him why, and he said that he didn't want to see 'so many damn fools' wearing it."<ref>{{Cite news|last=Fisk|first=Robert|date=5 November 2011|title=Robert Fisk: Do those who flaunt the poppy on their lapels know that they mock the war dead?|url=https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/commentators/fisk/robert-fisk-do-those-who-flaunt-poppy-their-lapels-know-they-mock-war-dead-6257416.html|access-date=15 November 2020|work=The Independent}}</ref> He returned to the subject in 2014, the standfirst summarised his experience "My family was haunted by my father's experience on the Somme and the loss of his friends. Why do we pay homage to the dead but ignore the lessons of their war?"<ref>{{Cite news|last=Fisk|first=Robert|title=WWI Centenary: My father threw away his poppy in disgust|url=https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/comment/first-world-war-centenary-my-father-threw-away-his-poppy-disgust-9645299.html|date=5 August 2014|access-date=15 November 2020|work=The Independent}}</ref> and in 2016 where he said "His example was one of great courage. He fought for his country and then, unafraid, he threw his poppy away. Television celebrities do not have to fight for their country – yet they do not even have the guts to break this fake conformity and toss their sordid poppies in the office waste paper bin."<ref>{{Cite news|date=3 November 2016|last=Fisk|first=Robert|title=The poppy has become a symbol of racism – I have never worn one, and now I never will|url=https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/poppy-symbol-racism-never-worn-one-never-will-robert-fisk-remembrance-day-first-world-war-second-world-war-a7394976.html|access-date=15 November 2020|work=The Independent}}</ref>