Is the BBC anti Israel and/or antisemitic

[Newbutoldfather]

BBC coverage ‘institutionally hostile’ to Israel, say Jewish groups

https://www.thetimes.com/article/a4aa31e2-0084-4bf4-bb33-b93d02917440?shareToken=e38d95867859d345f297becf90753213

As a secular Jew who recognises that the current Israeli government has made many mistakes and is arguably racist, I still do find the BBC’s coverage to be horribly biased against Israel.

It isn’t just the words they use but the tone they use, the juxtaposition of the words and images, errors off omission, and also the time allocated to either side’s perspective.

As an example, when Nasrallah was killed, there was about 5 minutes about how Israel had killed a major leader of the Axis of Resistance, delivered in a stentorian and sad tone, pictures of mourning Lebanese and lots on whether this wouldn’t push the conflict over the edge (with lots of powerful images of the bombing, crying women etc). There was then a very brief cut to the IDF statement with very little comment.

Both Orla Guerin and Jeremy Bowen have been accused of antisemitism many many times over the years, but they are knowledgeable, clever and slippery. And, most importantly, very litigious with licence payer’s money. It is very hard to nail them as, as I mentioned above, a lot of it is about juxtaposition, tone and only telling half the story (see link attached).

But maybe I am wrong? I would love to hear others’ opinions. Remember this is about BBC bias only, not your overall view on Israel or the ‘Axis of Resistance’.

Yes there have. They've found their news to be biased in favour of Israel, as I referenced earlier.

They've also been found to favour Conservatives, Eurosceptics & Business.

https://theconversation.com/hard-evidence-how-biased-is-the-bbc-17028

Also, found biased against Corbyn in both Birbeck and LSE studies. https://theconversation.com/media-bias-against-jeremy-corbyn-shows-how-politicised-reporting-has-become-71593

It's pretty obvious that perception and reality are two very different things, as evidenced by the results in the poll in this thread.

I didn’t want to comment on the results until my poll closed.

But if -10 was pro Israel and +10 was anti Israel, the result is +1.6, or slightly anti Israel.

I still think it is worse than that over time, but that is the MN view.

It was a very reasonable question to ask as, for me, I'd already seen how the BBC's news coverage could be slanted. Their reporting of the second Gulf war became very Gung Ho once the conflict actually started and the coverage of Corbyn convinced me that BBC news could, if it wished, dismiss objectivity and follow an agenda.
As for the current conflict, I think with one or two exceptions, it's been pretty fair in that it's done its best to outline the horrors and their perpetrators. In addition to that it has attempted to give context. Its analysis has also, on the whole, been impartial, though there have been a few occasions when I have questioned this.

Just last week there was the headline on a Bowen piece ( now removed) that said West are powerless to influence Israel (or words to that effect ) which I believe to be a falsehood as it implied that we should just shrug our shoulders and let them get on with whatever they want. The west isn't "powerless".
Apart from that, Bowen has been OK. a bit waffly at times but generally gets it right. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think he speaks arabic, which would be a hindrance.

It's very disturbing though, that Journalists have not been allowed into Gaza without being under strict supervision and disgraceful that so many journalists have been targeted and worrying that Al Jazeera has been prevented from having journalists in Israel. I know there's a war going on, but people might think that Israel has got something(s) to hide.

It doesn't matter what you think, or what a poll suggests, if the actual evidenced research suggests otherwise. For all we know it could be Team Jorge or the Israeli-Egyptian bot farms at work again.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Team_Jorge

Bear in mind I didn't vote because I believe the BBC is biased in general. There was no option for that

So Robbie Gibb, the front for the owners of the Jewish Chronicle, who sits on the board at the BBC and has responsibility for impartiality (he's the one who tried to block appointments on political grounds) is somehow overseeing anti-Israel bias in their news?

https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/jewish-chronicle-scandal-editor-robbie-gibb-b2613454.html

Hasn't the JC been found to be making stuff up about the conflict?

www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/ckgnn153zg1o.amp

Well, yes. It's been making stuff up for a while.

Amongst many others was this by Luke Akehurst, former Israel lobbyist & current leading light of the JLM (although not Jewish himself)

https://www.jewishvoiceforlabour.org.uk/article/press-regulator-finds-jewish-chronicle-guilty-of-multiple-breaches-of-editors-code/

Thanks for the article. They seem to have moved very hard right in the last few years though they still had prominent left wing writers who have now resigned. They have been found guilty of over 40 breaches in their reporting with several journalists simply making things up. Not knowing who owns them hardly helps.

I'm not Jewish nor particularly pro Israel but yes, BBC is clearly biased against Israel (and in general has become more overtly left wing). They are no longer impartial and the licence fee should be scrapped.

No organisation will ever be totally impartial. But the BBC tries a lot harder to be impartial than any other news organisation.

I don’t think it does try that hard tbh

Can you bring any actual evidence of these claims?

Is there any other media organisation which you think does?

No I usually take any media with their editorial viewpoint in mind

The BBC is different however as it is by licence fee and also claims to be impartial unlike others

Although I do find the world service better and if it were subscription I’d likely pay for that and R6 music

If you say anything against Israel you are anti-semitic so following that argument, then yes they are.

Interesting as I would argue the opposite.

I guess the fact that some of us see overt hostility to Israel in BBC coverage while others see the complete opposite might suggest the content falls somewhere in the middle?

@Newbutoldfather
The IDF shot at Orla Guerin while she was reporting a nonviolent protest.From the Irish Independent “May 5 2002
"I didn't have time to be scared, I was just so shocked," Orla said from the Jerusalem office of the BBC. "He was standing no more than 10 feet away and he looked at us for 10 seconds before firing.The attack was captured on film”. The BBC made a formal complaint to the Israeli government.
So no love lost there for good reason.
After that, the Israeli government made a formal complaint about her a few years later when they staged a photo-opportunity of a child who had been radicalised. They didn’t like that she made it clear that it was choreographed to be used as propaganda. The child involved was understood to have mental health issues and learning difficulties.At the time they were trying to put considerable pressure on various high profile news agencies to present a pro- Israeli point of view by show casing identifiable underage children that had been manipulated by terrorists into becoming suicide bombers. The Israeli government also were very unhappy with the BBC about a BBC documentary that claimed Israel had secret weapons of mass destruction.
So that looks like a with hunt of an unbiased journalist
https://www.theguardian.com/media/2004/apr/01/bbc.israel

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hussam_Abdo

So the third incident relates to her reporting of a Holocaust memorial event during course of which four and a half minute report, she referred briefly to Israel’s position as a regional power(true) , that it has occupied the Palestinian Territories for decades(true) and finally what caused such offence”But some here will always see their nation through the prism of persecution and survival”- also true and providing context.
Orla Guerin has probably spent longer in Israel than yourself and reporting is her job.
It’s not her job to be Israel’s propaganda mouthpiece.

No, I don’t think the BBC are anti Israel or antisemitic, I think they are anti Israeli propaganda.

Is the Israeli government upset that the BBC write articles about the crimes they are committing all over the place? Probably.

Thanks for that. I figured there would be a bit of context here. I mean Orla Guerinbis is massively respected, so to accuse her of antisemitism with no evidence is pretty rubbish.

https://www.aljazeera.com/amp/news/2024/10/5/failing-gaza-pro-israel-bias-uncovered-behind-the-lens-of-western-media

I think the BBC overall have given good coverage of the conflict.

One thing I think all the media have been a bit slow upon is the scale of the tactical victories that Israel have achieved given Hizbollah were meant to be a 'powerful' force in the middle East and Hamas were to engage in urban warfare that was to leave 100s of IDF dead. Also I think the BBC news need to make clear when announcing casualties in Gaza and Lebanon that they include terrorists as those groups don't release figures.

At least the BBC are covering memorial ceremonies for the October 7th victims in London and getting their voices. The Guardian seem to have skipped this event and view of October 7th simply as start of Israeli bombing of Gaza.

This is a really good example of subtle anti Israel bias:

This is Jeremy Bowen’s retrospective of the year following the 7/10 terrorist attack on civilians.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c781vgy3918o

‘The Hamas offensive came out of well over a century of unresolved conflict. After Hamas burst through the thinly defended border, it inflicted the worst day the Israelis had suffered.

Around 1,200 people, mostly Israeli civilians, were killed. Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, phoned President Joe Biden and told him that “We’ve never seen such savagery in the history of the state”; not “since the Holocaust.” Israel saw the attacks by Hamas as a threat to its existence.

Since then, Israel has inflicted many terrible days on the Palestinians in Gaza. Nearly 42,000 people, mostly civilians have been killed, according to the Hamas-run health ministry. Much of Gaza is in ruins. Palestinians accuse Israel of genocide.’

The word ‘offensive’ is nearly always used to describe military attacks on military targets; I never heard 9/11 being described as an Al Qaeda ‘offensive’! And, in the same sentence, the justification: ‘a century of unresolved conflict’. Would you hear the 9/11 attacks described in any mainstream media as ‘The Al Qa’eda offensive came after over a century of the U.S’s involvement in the Middle East….’? I think not.

In addition there is the false equivalence of a terrorist attack with Israel defending its own borders.

As ever, it is subtle and under the guise of a balanced article, but for anyone who can parse an article carefully, the bias is pretty clearly there.