BBC accused of ‘pushing Hamas lies’ after whistleblower report found Gaza coverage ‘minimised Israeli suffering’

An internal memo, sent to BBC managers by Prescott and seen by The Telegraph, reportedly read: “Claims against Israel seem to be raced to air or online without adequate checks, evidencing either carelessness or a desire always to believe the worst about Israel.

"The errors come thick and fast, sometimes with ‘eyewitness’ territory from locals who have tweeted in praise of the October 7 killings and worse. The BBC needs to accept it has systemic issues with the coverage. Only then can the process properly begin to fix the problem.”

As an example it reportedly highlighted what it called “critically different treatment” of the rocket attacks on a Golan Heights village, which killed nine children July 2024.

The English version reportedly included Hezbollah’s denial of responsibility, but included evidence that the group had fired on nearby areas. The Arabic version, however, apparently gave more prominence to the denial, omitted evidence of other rocket attacks and failed to mention that children had been killed.

This was reportedly followed the next day by an Arabic article suggesting that Israel may have faked the attack.

"It is hard to conclude anything other than that BBC Arabic’s story treatment was designed to minimise Israeli suffering and paint Israel as the aggressor,” wrote Prescott.

And he alleged that “ unjustifiable weight” was given to death toll figures provided by the Hamas-run Gaza Ministry of Health, which have previously been shown to be inflated and fail to distinguish between civilian and combatant casualties.

Finally, he highlighted the delay in correcting a claim made by various BBC reports that the International Court of Justice (ICJ) had ruled in January last year that there was a “plausible case of genocide”.

The ICJ, as explained by former court president Joan Donoghue on the BBC’s own HardTalk programme, had only ruled the Palestinians were plausibly entitled to protection from genocide under international law, without commenting on whether such a genocide was actually occurring.

This claim was not corrected for several months, prompting Prescott to query: “The ICJ report runs to just 26 pages and is written in non-technical language. Had no BBC reporter troubled themselves to read it?”

"The BBC is prone to downplaying criticism by saying it receives similar numbers of complaints from both sides. Looking at the evidence set out above, it seems very hard for any pro-Palestinian observers to make a compelling case that the BBC has a pro-Israel bias,” he added.

Danny Cohen, the former director of BBC Television, called on BBC executives to “hang their heads in shame and resign”.

He told the JC: “Now we have the proof of what the Jewish community in Britain has long known: that demonisation of Israel by the BBC is a consistent and very serious problem.

"What is so important about this leaked report is that it comes from an insider who has had access to the corridors of BBC News over a three-year period. He has clearly been appalled by what he discovered and by the failure of senior management to deal with it.

"There can no longer be any delay. The government and the BBC must act and carry out root and branch reform. They should start by shutting down BBC Arabic and its poisonous output.”

John Ware, a longtime reporter for the BBC’s Panorama programme, added: “The situation at BBC Arabic appears unfixable, it’s just Groundhog Day.”

And the Israeli embassy in London said it was “extremely alarmed” by the report.

A spokesperson said: “We have long been concerned about the output of BBC Arabic, and today’s report, based on information from the BBC’s Editorial Guidelines and Standards Committee, confirms these suspicions and that high-ranking BBC officials were aware.

"Today’s revelations show that senior staff were repeatedly warned about this bias but did not take action. We call on the BBC to investigate this immediately and take serious steps to ensure accountability.
“Funding to BBC Arabic must be halted. It has abandoned the standards of credible journalism and has featured antisemites while promoting clear bias. Public funds cannot support a platform that undermines accuracy and journalistic integrity.”

The JC has previously reported on allegations of anti-Israel and anti-Jewish bias in BBC Arabic’s coverage.

In September, we revealed that the channel’s Egypt MeanTime programme had interviewed Professor Gamal Qalyoubi, who wrote in a 2024 article that American Jews were “holding the keys to wealth, politics, and the media” and had “infiltrated the institutions of the American people,” according to a translation by pro-Israel media monitoring NGO Camera.

And in April, it emerged that Samer Elzaenen, a journalist featured on BBC Arabic, had repeatedly incited violence against Jews, including calling for them to be burned “as Hitler did”, and praised more than 30 attacks on Israeli civilians over the past decade.

A BBC spokesperson said: “While we don’t comment on leaked documents, when the BBC receives feedback, it takes it seriously and considers it carefully.

“With regard to BBC News Arabic, where mistakes have been made or errors have occurred, we have acknowledged them at the time and taken action. We have also previously acknowledged that certain contributors should not have been used and have improved our processes to avoid a repeat of this.”