The BBC is set to appoint an independent figure to investigate the channel’s Arabic arm after repeated allegations of antisemitism were exposed by British newspaper The Telegraph, the paper reported on Saturday.
Dr Samer Shah, chairman of the BBC, said on Saturday that the corporation would also examine its handling of reporting on the Israel-Hamas War.
Previous exposés from the Telegraph have seen posts supporting October 7, Hamas, and the Holocaust brought to light.
Shah told Times Radio: “The Arabic service, we are looking at it, we’ve been examining it. I think this whole business of how we’ve covered Israel-Gaza is a proper thing to examine thoroughly, which is why we’re going to identify… we’re going to get hold of an independent figure to look at our coverage.”
Samer Elzaenen, the latest journalist exposed by the Telegraph, posted violent antisemitic content on social media, calling to burn Jews “as Hitler did.”
In one post, he wrote: “My message to the Zionist Jews: We are going to take our land back, we love death for Allah’s sak,e the same way you love life. We shall burn you as Hitler did, but this time we won’t have a single one of you left.”
Elzaenen has appeared on the BBC’s Arabic site more than a dozen times since Hamas’s October 7 attacks and the resulting war.
Shah said: “That one (Elzaenen) is also being investigated. The Arabic service, we are looking at it, we’ve been examining it.
“We’re going to get some independent figure to look at this thoroughly, and that will include BBC Arabic.”
The BBC’s coverage of the Israel-Hamas War
British lawyer Trevor Asserson released a report in September, which found the corporation broke its own editorial guidelines on the Israel-Hamas War over 1500 times over the course of the conflict.
Asserson’s investigation found the BBC’s Arabic channel was responsible for some of the most biased reporting on the war out of all global media outlets. Eleven cases were brought to light by the report, in which the BBC Arabic’s coverage of the war featured reporters who made public statements in support of terrorism, specifically supporting Hamas.
The BBC also previously launched an investigation after it was discovered that the family of a Hamas official was paid for the participation of the terrorist’s son in a documentary about life in Gaza.
The family of Abdullah al-Yazouri, the 13-year-old who narrated the documentary Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone, was paid £790 for his role.
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