Fiery rows are bound to have broken out at BBC headquarters on Monday evening after an article headline prompted further questions about its coverage of Hamas.
The corporation has refused to describe the child-murdering terrorists of Hamas as “terrorists.” It has used up a lot of time and column space defending this decision on the grounds of “impartiality”—grounds that have not been upheld by Hamas-backing, taxpayer-paid BBC journalists in the Middle East—and shows no sign of backing down.
Yet shortly after reports emerged of this week’s terrorist attack in Brussels, which saw two Swedish football fans shot dead, the BBC published an article on its website with the headline:
Brussels shooting: Suspect at large after two Swedes killed in terror attack. (Emphasis added)
It wasn’t long before editors swung in and axed any mention of “terror,” while likely raining down on those who published what a statement described as a “mistake.” The corporation said that “the headline should have attributed the words, so it was swiftly changed.”
But the damage had already been done. The BBC was soon levelled with accusations of hypocrisy, with the Campaign Against Antisemitism charity asking, “How low will the BBC stoop to avoid calling terror by its name?”
Veteran broadcaster and BBC World Affairs Editor John Simpson has written for the BBC saying that while the government describes Hamas as a terrorist organisation, “Terrorism is a loaded word, which people use about an outfit they disapprove of morally. It’s simply not the BBC’s job to tell people who to support and who to condemn—who are the good guys and who are the bad guys.”
After Monday evening’s slip, Tory MP Andrew Percy told The Daily Express that this “feeble and pathetic excuse” had been “[blown] out of the water.” But the corporation appears to be sticking with its guns, possibly becoming more defensive the more it is lambasted.
