BBC Arabic is corroding the corporation with Middle East-imported extremism

Yet it is only one of many revelations in a confidential memo, recently leaked to the Telegraph, written by independent adviser and former journalist Michael Prescott. Circulated to the entire BBC board, Prescott’s report lays bare how the Arabic service has become a reliable ally of Hamas’s propaganda machine, in utter dereliction of BBC editorial guidelines and always at the expense of Israel and Jewish communities worldwide, including Britain’s own.

For those who have monitored the Arabic service closely, Prescott’s finding that these problems are “systemic” is not new. What is shocking are the details. A BBC Arabic contributor who once declared that Jews should be burned “as Hitler did” appeared on air 244 times. Another freelancer who called Jews “devils” has been featured 522 times. That such individuals were permitted to report unchallenged on the Gaza war even after their antisemitic records were exposed speaks volumes about the culture of bias for which BBC Arabic editors are responsible, and which UK taxpayers and licence fee payers have been funding for many years.

More disturbing findings: according to Prescott, between May and October 2024 BBC Arabic failed to publish any of the 19 English-language stories on Hamas’s hostages, ran no pieces critical of the terror group, and consistently downplayed Israeli suffering. Rather than a public broadcasting service worthy of its name, this can only be described as extremist advocacy, inflaming prejudice against Israel and fuelling conflict rather than informing and encouraging debate.

As the Telegraph revealed last weekend, drawing upon research by Camera (the Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting and Analysis), BBC Arabic had to make corrections or clarifications on 215 stories over the course of the war. That’s more than two pieces of information each week over two years found to be biased, inaccurate or misleading.

But the rot runs deeper still. Prescott’s memo quotes Munro praising BBC Arabic’s reporters for delivering “exceptional journalism”, calling them “an unrivalled source of knowledge” for the wider BBC. Remember: among those reporters is Sally Nabil, who, shortly after the horrors of October 7, “liked” a series of posts praising and justifying the massacre, one of them describing it as a “morning of hope”. Evidently lacking the basic journalistic skill of distinguishing combatants from civilians, not only does she remain employed at BBC Arabic, but her reporting on alleged civilian casualties in Beirut following an IDF raid has even been broadcast to British audiences on BBC Breakfast.

Nabil is one of at least six BBC Arabic staff members who have repeatedly posted or liked comments glorifying violence against Israel’s Jewish civilians, yet faced no meaningful consequences even after being publicly exposed. For Munro to hold such individuals up as an “unrivalled source of knowledge” for the rest of the BBC to rely on reveals a worse yet truth about how the corporation now operates. Rather than projecting British values abroad, BBC Arabic is exporting its own contaminated narratives back into the English-language newsroom, having imported them from extremists in the Middle East. 

This inversion of purpose directly contradicts the “soft power” doctrine on which the BBC’s foreign language services were founded. Here is at least part of the explanation for why anti-Israel bias has become so deeply entrenched across the corporation. BBC Arabic is not merely failing in its mission; it is actively corroding the editorial standards the entire BBC claims to uphold.

A full parliamentary inquiry – or, failing that, the closure of the Arabic service – may now be the only means left to protect the national broadcaster from being consumed by its own indefensible bias.

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David Grom is a Camera Arabic researcher