Mick Hartley

No surprise here. On one of those "experts" interviewed by the BBC and others, from the JC:

Standing in military fatigues beside the IRGC logo, this is the “Iran expert” who caused outrage on the BBC last week with a rant about “chosen people” who believe they “have exceptional rights to the whole region”.

Posted on social media in 2019 by Iranian academic and BBC pundit Seyed Mohammad Marandi, the caption reads: “This photo was proudly taken… when I was a 16 year old volunteer fighting the US backed invasion of Iran.”

That unit was the 27th army of Muhammad Rasulullah, an IRGC division that has been described as “notoriously ideological” and was set up by Commander Ahmad Motevaselian, one of the founders of the terror group Hezbollah.

The picture raises serious questions about how the BBC, Sky and Channel 4 — all of whom used Marandi as a pundit — vet “experts” before broadcasting their views into millions of households.

Marandi has been promoting Hezbollah and its incendiary narrative about Israel on BBC, Sky and Channel 4 widely since Israel went to war with Hezbollah in Lebanon….

Marandi’s close links to the top of the Iranian dictatorship also come via his family – his father, Alireza, is Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s personal doctor.

In an echo of Iranian regime rhetoric, Marandi also celebrated the Hamas terror attacks, writing on social media on October 7 2023: “It's been a great and historic day. Israel can't even defeat the besieged Gazans. How can the regime even contemplate confrontation with Hezbollah, let alone the Islamic Republic of Iran? It's time for colonisers to go back to their homes in Europe and North America.”

Campaigners and politicians are now asking whether the broadcasters knew about Marandi’s ideological and military background or whether there were vetting failures. 

The BBC and Channel 4 have referred to Marandi’s links to the Iranian government and role on Iran’s nuclear team in 2015 – when the regime had a more “moderate” president, Hassan Rouhani – during interviews.

But he is usually introduced as an academic at the University of Tehran, and his links to the very extreme wing of the regime – the Raisi government, the ayatollah and the IRGC – have been omitted.

Marandi has used his platform to promote Hezbollah, a proscribed terrorist group – which he described as “heroes” in a Channel 4 interview earlier this month – and make extreme statements about Israel, which he has accused of carrying out a “Holocaust” in BBC and Sky interviews.

Kasra Aarabi, director of IRGC Research at United Against Nuclear Iran, told the JC: “Marandi is one of the Iranian regime’s main propagandists. He is the son of the supreme leader’s personal doctor, served in the IRGC – the regime’s terror arm which created Hezbollah – and was even an adviser to the nuclear team under former president and hardline cleric Ebrahim Raisi. Despite this, Western outlets – like the BBC, Sky News and Channel 4 – frequently invite Marandi without disclosing his troubling CV to their audiences, referring to Marandi as simply an ‘Iranian academic’. For an outlet like the BBC, which claims to take impartiality very seriously, the failure to disclose Marandi’s deep affiliation with the regime is a major oversight.”

Campaign Against Antisemitism (CAA) said it was “astonishing that either the BBC failed to do its due diligence or did, and decided hosted him regardless”.

Lord Austin, who sits as a life peer in the House of Lords, told the JC: “It’s either further evidence of the BBC’s bias against Israel or a newsroom team which is out of control and whose editorial checks are in disarray.”…

In his October 1 appearance on the Today programme with presenter Mishal Husain, Marandi said: “Just as the UK supports this Holocaust in Gaza… we have no doubt they will be with the Israelis until the very last Palestinian.

“They are the chosen people, they are your allies.. It’s an expansionist regime, it believes in ethno-supremacism, it believes they are the chosen people, [that] they have exceptional rights to the whole region.”

Husain did not intervene as he made those statements and instead close the conversation by saying “thank you”.

The interview prompted outrage from the Board of Deputies, the Jewish leadership Council and community figures including Simon Schama and Simon Sebag Montefiore. The BBC said in response to complaints that Marandi should have been challenged on those comments.

A spokesperson for CAA said: “When a guest is spewing putrid rhetoric that invokes Holocaust comparisons, the normal thing to do is to challenge them. At the BBC, the normal thing to do is to thank them for coming on the programme. This is a disgrace.”

It's a familiar feature of Islamist advocacy, to accuse the Jews of precisely what they themselves are guilty of….believing that "they have exceptional rights to the whole region".