BBC reiterates commitment to thematic review of Gaza coverage

The BBC has reportedly reiterated its intention to launch a “thematic review” into its Gaza coverage and BBC Arabic.

Samir Shah, the Chair of the BBC, has told Times Radio: “The [BBC] Arabic service, we are looking at it, we’ve been examining it. I think this whole business of how we’ve covered Israel-Gaza is a proper thing to examine thoroughly, which is why we’re going to identify… we’re going to get hold of an independent figure to look at our coverage.”

This comes after the BBC told Jewish media last month: “We take the matters raised with us extremely seriously and have updated them [the Board of Deputies] on a number of the topics they raise, including around training for staff and launching an independent Thematic Review of our Israel-Gaza coverage. The BBC is committed to upholding the highest possible editorial standards across our output, reporting impartially to maintain the trust of audiences. The conduct and welfare of all of our staff is an absolute priority and we have well-established and robust processes in place to handle any concerns or complaints raised with us.”

It is understood that this “thematic review” of the standard of the BBC’s Gaza coverage will be drafted for presentation to the BBC Board, and will be “independent and published in full”.

The announcement, such as it is, comes some two months after Mr Shah suggested before the Culture Media and Sport Committee that a thematic review might be on the table, and just days after yet another BBC Arabic contributor who reports on the Hamas-Israel conflict was alleged to have published antisemitic rhetoric on social media.

The scandal has arisen following the broadcast earlier this year of a so-called documentary, ‘Gaza How to Survive a War Zone’, which was narrated by the son of a senior Hamas official, whose family was paid with licence fee funds for the son’s participation. The BBC launched an internal review, which, almost three months since the broadcast, has yet to report its findings.

Our polling shows the overwhelming majority — 92% — of British Jews believe media bias against Israel fuels antisemitism, and look on the BBC’s coverage disfavorably (it performs the worst among broadcasters). We need a full and independent inquiry into the BBC’s coverage of the Jewish state.

Since the scandal erupted earlier this year, Campaign Against Antisemitism has:

• Called for an independent investigation into the scandal and into BBC bias in its Israel coverage more broadly.
• Held multiple protests outside Broadcasting House.
• Urged the scrapping of the ‘BBC First’ policy, whereby the BBC, uniquely among broadcasters, is able to mark its own homework before a complaint can be escalated to Ofcom.
• Commissioned and published polling (conducted by YouGov) that showed that 57% of the British public back an independent investigation into the BBC Gaza film scandal and only 21% do not.
• Launched a petition calling for a suspension of the licence fee pending an independent investigation.

A spokesperson for Campaign Against Antisemitism said: “Why go through the charade of an internal review only to accept, weeks later, the need for an independent investigation? We called for that from the start but the BBC, as usual, tried to dig in its heels. Given the BBC’s record, does anyone trust the BBC to appoint someone truly independent to investigate itself? BBC bosses still haven’t got a grip on this scandal.”