An article by journalist Owen Jones about the BBC’s coverage of the conflict in Gaza is an attack on the “journalistic integrity” of the corporation’s regional Middle East online news editor, the High Court has been told.
In an article published in December last year, Jones claimed that BBC staff had told him that Raffi Berg “plays a key role in a wider BBC culture of ‘systematic Israeli propaganda’” and “repeatedly seeks to foreground the Israeli military perspective while stripping away Palestinian humanity”.
Berg, who joined the BBC in 2001 and has been Middle East regional editor for its news website for 12 years, denies the claims in the article, titled The BBC’s Civil War Over Gaza.
He is now suing Jones for libel and is seeking damages, an injunction preventing Jones from republishing the article, and an order requiring websites to take down the piece.
Jones is defending the claim and has previously said he will “vigorously” defend his reporting.
At a hearing on Friday, which both journalists attended, barristers asked a judge to rule on several preliminary issues in the case, including whether the article has a defamatory meaning and whether it was a statement of fact or an expression of opinion.
John Stables, for Berg, told the court that the meaning conveyed by the article was that his client was a “bent journalist”, “rotten”, and an “Israeli stooge”.
He continued in written submissions that the piece made “explicit statements” that Berg “carries out his job, his role, deliberately with a pro-Israeli bias; and that it is very evident that Berg’s work is intentionally biased because it is widely recognised as such”.
He also said that the article “singled out” Berg and attacked his “journalistic integrity”, offering “no antidote” to the claims.
The barrister said: “The article read as a whole would be readily understood to be largely focused on Berg and as being the product of investigation, of fact-finding, rather than mere commentary.”
He also said that the article made “statements of fact” including alleging that Berg “carries out his job deliberately to produce biased ‘propaganda’ that favours Israel, editing and writing news reports that promote Israel’s interests knowingly falsely”.
The article, published on the Drop Site News website, said that the corporation was facing an “internal revolt over its reporting” of the conflict.
It continued that journalists had claimed that Berg “sets the tone for the BBC’s digital output on Israel and Palestine”, and that complaints from staff about the corporation’s coverage had been “repeatedly brushed aside”.
Jones’ piece also claimed that “facts unfavourable to Israel have been stripped out of Berg’s reports” and that he played a “crucial role” in “conduct that imperils the integrity of the BBC”.
In court documents in support of Berg’s claim, Stables previously said that the allegations in the article had caused the journalist to suffer “an onslaught of hatred, intimidation and threats”, including death threats.
Aidan Eardley KC, for Jones, said in written submissions for Friday’s hearing that the article was “firmly focused on the BBC’s Gaza coverage for which Berg is responsible”, and that there was “no wider attack on his adherence to journalistic standards generally”.
He continued that claims that Berg had “deliberately” breached editorial guidelines or was “intentionally” biased were “not supported by the text”.
Eardley said: “The article is simply not concerned with Berg’s motives and intentions.
“The article identifies a problem, a perception, widely-held among BBC journalists, that the Gaza coverage for which Berg is responsible displays pro-Israel bias, and an alleged failure by BBC management to take the journalists’ concerns seriously.”
He continued: “No reasonable reader would come away from it thinking that they had been told that Berg was consciously pursuing an improper agenda.”
Judgment in the case has been reserved.
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