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Wednesday, November 20, 2024

Staff of BBC calls out broadcaster for pro-Israel reporting

Over 100 BBC employees accuse the channel of pro-Israel bias, calling for fair and impartial reporting on Gaza.

More than 100 employees of BBC have accused the channel of being ‘pro-Israel’. In a letter signed by the employees, they accused the broadcaster of providing favorable reporting to Israel. The employees have asked the channel to “recommit to fairness, accuracy, and impartiality” over its reporting on Gaza.

In a letter sent Tim Davie, signed by 230 members of media industry and nearly 100 anonymous employees of BBC, the corporation is denounced for failing its own standards of fair and impartial reporting by lacking  “consistently fair and accurate evidence-based journalism in its coverage of Gaza”.

The letter has been signed by Sayeeda Warsi and actor Juliet Stevenson. The letter calls BBC to report on Israel-Gaza conflict “without fear or favour” and to “recommit to the highest editorial standards – with emphasis on fairness, accuracy, and due impartiality”.

The letter also urges BBC to implement a series of editorial commitments including “reiterating that Israel does not give external journalists access to Gaza; making it clear when there is insufficient evidence to back up Israeli claims; making clear where Israel is the perpetrator in article headlines; including regular historical context predating October 2023; and robustly challenging Israeli government and military representatives in all interviews”.

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BBC has denied these accusations. It claims to “strives to live up to our responsibility to deliver the most trusted and impartial news”.

A spokesperson said: “When we make mistakes or have made changes to the way we report, we are transparent. We are also very clear with our audiences on the limitations put on our reporting – including the lack of access into Gaza and restricted access to parts of Lebanon, and our continued efforts to get reporters into those areas.”

Other signatories of the letters are historian William Dalrymple, Dr. Catherine Harper-a senior lecturer at University of Glasgow, broadcaster John Nicolson, Rizwana Hamid- the director at Center of Media Monitoring.