Last night both the BBC and Sky refused to join ITV, Channel 4 and Five to broadcast an aid appeal for Gaza by the Disasters Emergency Committee (DEC).

The BBC apparently feared losing its impartiality in the eyes of its viewers. It believes that because the Gaza story is still a "current" story, it does not wish to be seen to be taking sides. I cannot even begin to fathom the official reasoning behind the decision on this one.

Since when has denying the opportunity to a generous British public to save lives become a "political" issue?

The emergency appeal was being made by experienced, impartial, capable and highly professional British charities. Do the BBC and Sky not share the confidence of the British people in the DEC to do the job that needs to be done?

I have always believed that humanitarian needs outweighed all others. But it appears that the BBC is more concerned about what its viewers in Tel Aviv think than what its licence fee payers here in the UK believe is right.

The BBC and Sky have both made appeals for the DEC before, during other "current" conflicts, including the Congo, the Balkans and Darfur. How is Gaza any different?

The answer to this riddle may lie in the fact that the last time the BBC refused to broadcast an appeal was during the 2006 conflict in Lebanon. In that conflict, as in Gaza now, the protagonist was Israel.

The British public are not thick. We know the difference between a news story and a humanitarian appeal. By not broadcasting the appeal the BBC and Sky appear to have shown themselves, in my view, to be alarmingly sensitive to criticism from Israel.

It may be purely coincidental, but of all the broadcasters – the BBC, Sky, ITV, Channel 4 and Five – only the BBC and Sky broadcast directly into Israel.

By preventing a humanitarian appeal for the people of Gaza, the BBC and Sky have both, albeit unwittingly, played a significant part in what I believe is an ongoing trend.

Back in 2004, a UK Parliamentary committee stated there was "a deliberate Israeli policy of putting the lives of ordinary Palestinians under stress as part of a strategy to bring the population to heel".

I believe that policy is still going on today.

In the meantime, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has promised Israel's full support to defend its soldiers against accusations of war crimes.

As the fog of war begins to clear, and the independent journalists are allowed back into Gaza, the full horrifying picture of what Israel has done there is becoming clear.

Israel has used white phosphorous shells, DIME explosives, bulldozed the civilian infrastructure and wiped many Palestinian villages off the map. All of it amounts to war crimes, but still Olmert confidently assures his soldiers of state protection against such charges.

Today is Holocaust Memorial Day here in the UK, so all this is particularly distasteful.