The BBC and the Guardian have failed to correct reports accusing Israel of genocide and of killing a child, and ignored a letter by hundreds of academics rebutting the genocide allegations.
Both outlets last week trumpeted a resolution by the International Association of Genocide Scholars (IAGS) accusing Israel of committing genocide in Gaza. The Guardian described IAGS as “the world’s top scholars on the crime”, while the BBC pushed a phone alert to millions of users, citing the “world’s leading experts”.
But as the JC reported, IAGS operates on an open-membership model, allowing anyone to join the organisation for a fee with no academic credentials required. When these facts emerged, the group admitted that many of its members are not scholars at all.
"We aim to be inclusive and democratic by keeping the door open to artists, advocates, independent scholars, indigenous scholars, global majority scholars, marginalised communities, and survivors,” IAGS said last week. “The goal is to include the voices of those who may not have PhDs, official institutional affiliation, or the financial means to access ‘conventional’ education that often privileges the Global North forms of expertise.”
