New Report from former BBC Director Criticizes Coverage of Israel-Hamas Conflict

[Social Media]

 

The BBC faces significant scrutiny for its coverage of the Israel-Hamas conflict following a report authored by Danny Cohen, the broadcaster’s former director of television. The 60-page report argues that the BBC has “serious questions to answer” due to alleged repeated inaccuracies in its reporting of the ongoing war. Cohen, who held his position from 2013 to 2015, assembled the report based on research conducted by CAMERA U.K. and CAMERA Arabic, branches of the U.S.-based Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting and Analysis (CAMERA).

 

Alongside Baroness Ruth Deech, a former BBC governor and House of Lords member, Cohen co-wrote the report’s foreword, asserting that while errors can occur in journalism, the BBC’s “mistakes” consistently exhibit an anti-Israel bias. “The ‘mistakes’ are almost always in the anti-Israel direction,” they argue. They suggest that for Israel and the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), even concrete evidence often proves insufficient, while Hamas rarely has its claims rigorously scrutinized.

 

The report details numerous alleged instances of inaccurate reporting on Israel’s actions in the conflict. It accuses the BBC of broadcasting “false and damaging claims about Israel’s conduct of this war” and producing what it describes as “misleading broadcasts and social media output.” It further references a separate study from earlier in the month by a group of lawyers and data scientists, which found that the BBC had violated its editorial standards over 1,500 times in its coverage of Israel, pointing to a pattern of “widespread anti-Israel bias.”

 

The report also notes recent controversies involving the BBC’s handling of antisemitism. In June, more than 100 Jewish creatives signed an open letter accusing the BBC of double standards in its response to antisemitic remarks made by one of its contributors, following the BBC’s decision not to pursue any action. 

 

In response, the report recommends an independent inquiry into the BBC’s reporting practices related to the Israel-Hamas conflict. The complete findings and analysis by Cohen are available in the published report.

 

Based on a report from Variety 2024-10-26

 

 

 

 

 

[The Old Bull]

The press seems to believe that if you criticize Israel then you are pro- Palestinian or if you criticize Palestine you are pro-Israeli. In my eyes both sides are bad and so are the people that supply them with weapons.

[watchdog2]

"anti Israel bias":   what a bunch of b.s..    nowhere in the mainstream media can you find that bias.   stop the hasbara deluge!

[Bkk Brian]

1 minute ago, watchdog2 said:

"anti Israel bias":   what a bunch of b.s..    nowhere in the mainstream media can you find that bias.   stop the hasbara deluge!

The report is from the Daily Telegraph, also reported in the Guardian, the Times and others......lol

[Bday Prang]

in the early days of the conflict, the BBC refused to refer to hamas as terrorists, enough said

[placnx]

7 hours ago, Bkk Brian said:

The report is from the Daily Telegraph, also reported in the Guardian, the Times and others......lol

The report from CAMERA and related articles should be filtered by knowledge of the motives of CAMERA:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Committee_for_Accuracy_in_Middle_East_Reporting_in_America

 

[Bkk Brian]

28 minutes ago, placnx said:

The report from CAMERA and related articles should be filtered by knowledge of the motives of CAMERA:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Committee_for_Accuracy_in_Middle_East_Reporting_in_America

 

And? Why would you filter it? How would you filter it exactly? What would be the change in facts outlined in the report?

[JonnyF]

The BBC has been radically left wing for years.

 

Unfortunately, so is the government so I wouldn't expect any action until Labour can be dismissed. 

[placnx]

On 10/26/2024 at 8:23 PM, Bkk Brian said:

And? Why would you filter it? How would you filter it exactly? What would be the change in facts outlined in the report?

Maybe you should read the Wikipedia entry. The salient points:

"The Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America (CAMERA) is an American non-profit pro-Israel[2] media-monitoring, research and membership organization."

 

"Critics of CAMERA claim that it is an ‘extreme Israel advocacy group’,[12] aligned with hawkish rightwing viewpoints; that it pays stipended fellows to write anti-Palestinian articles; and that it employs smear and intimidation tactics, routinely targeting media and journalists critical of Israel and pro-Palestinian activists on campuses.[13][12][14]"

[Bkk Brian]

Just now, placnx said:

Maybe you should read the Wikipedia entry. The salient points:

"The Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America (CAMERA) is an American non-profit pro-Israel[2] media-monitoring, research and membership organization."

 

"Critics of CAMERA claim that it is an ‘extreme Israel advocacy group’,[12] aligned with hawkish rightwing viewpoints; that it pays stipended fellows to write anti-Palestinian articles; and that it employs smear and intimidation tactics, routinely targeting media and journalists critical of Israel and pro-Palestinian activists on campuses.[13][12][14]"

So you couldn't answer the simple questions then.

 

On 10/26/2024 at 8:23 PM, Bkk Brian said:

And? Why would you filter it? How would you filter it exactly? What would be the change in facts outlined in the report?

 

[placnx]

On 10/29/2024 at 3:08 PM, Bkk Brian said:

So you couldn't answer the simple questions then.

 

 

You have to consider the motivation for the report in the first place. It's a smear campaign.

[Bkk Brian]

1 hour ago, placnx said:

You have to consider the motivation for the report in the first place. It's a smear campaign.

No I consider facts, that facts are they are a credible organization that have in the past made reports that the BBC has made corrections on. They have also not failed a fact check in at least 5 years.

 

Have you even read the report? Or still stuck on shooting the messenger?