Mick Hartley

There’s that other BBC bias factor, of course: their Gaza coverage, and their hatred of Israel. Jonathan Sacerdoti at the Spectator:

The organisation’s bias is not subtle. It is not occasional. It is systematic. Certain worldviews are endlessly reinforced and opposing views treated as aberrations. This intellectual monoculture has had profound consequences. Nowhere has this been more evident than in the BBC’s reporting on the Middle East. Over the past two years, its coverage has descended into a mire of distortion, omission, and outright calumny, particularly in its treatment of Israel. Whether born of groupthink or malice, the result is the same: the British public has been misled, repeatedly and egregiously. But the BBC has actually been guilty of this for decades.

One need only consider the BBC Arabic service. Despite ample warnings, the corporation has employed individuals with clear records of anti-Semitism and radical bias. These are not idle accusations. Translations and investigations have exposed journalists and guests who have praised the savage assault on Israel on October 7, even invoking Hitler approvingly in reference to Jews. These individuals have been broadcast multiple times.

The departure of two high-profile executives won’t change any of the machine beneath them that constantly produces this material. Why does the world need another Arabic propaganda channel?

It’s not just BBC Arabic: it’s also the BBC’s top journalists, like Jeremy Bowen, and Lucy Williamson [see here].

When Jeremy Bowen, one of the BBC’s most senior correspondents, claimed that an Israeli strike had ‘flattened’ a hospital which other reports claimed resulted in 500 deaths, he was not engaging in intelligent reporting. He was making a claim unsupported by evidence. Those familiar with the region and with Israel’s military record could see immediately that the scene bore the hallmarks of a Palestinian rocket misfire. That is, in fact, what it was. Bowen has since refused to express regret. Whether intentional or not, the effect was the same, and the falsehood was aired as truth.

One mistake may be an error, two misfortune, but when the same pattern recurs over decades, always leaning in one direction, it looks like a habit or worse, a culture. The BBC has repeatedly blurred moral lines on Israel and antisemitism: it refused to call Hamas ‘terrorist’ even after October 7; mistranslated ‘Jews’ as ‘Israelis’ and scrubbed the word ‘jihad’ from subtitles to hide Palestinian antisemitism; and misrepresented Jewish children attacked on Oxford Street by suggesting they had used anti-Muslim slurs – an allegation later disproven.…