"It is high time that the licence fee payer ceases to be obliged to subsidise and amplify his bile,” it said
Lineker left the BBC “by mutual agreement” after the controversy and now appears regularly on his The Rest is Football podcast, which is produced by his podcast company, Goalhanger.
However, appearing on the podcast Palestine Deep Dive this week, Lineker addressed the “fallout” from the incident.
He said: “I felt that I did make a mistake because I missed an emoji on a post that I did, that I shared on Instagram, and I didn’t see that emoji.
"I am stupid but I’m not that stupid, to do something that would inflict self-harm in that way. But I was annoyed at myself for giving people the opportunity to have a pop at me.”
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Gary Lineker and the post he reshared on Instagram[Missing Credit]
Lineker, who was formerly the BBC’s highest-paid presenter, also said during the episode that “only I know whether I’m antisemitic, and I’m not”.
"I’m not anti anything but I’m really anti the killing of children, and that is my position, and at the moment that’s what the Israeli government is doing,” he went on.
"So, that conflation is where they’ve got you a little bit. It’s a very difficult one, and you have to tread very carefully in the way you say things.”
He also referred to Israel as a “rogue state” and called for the de-proscription of Palestine Action, calling the group’s ban under terrorism legislation “the biggest absurdity” and “nonsense”.
“Terrorist, little old ladies that are terrorists, I mean, really?” he said.
Lineker left the BBC in 2025 after issuing the apology over the controversy surrounding the rat imagery.
Following discussions with the BBC, it was announced that he would step down after presenting his final programme, ending a three-decade career with the broadcaster.
