The BBC has apologized for its years-long record of ignoring complaints about anti-Israel bias and antisemitism in its Arab-language department, the UK-based Jewish Chronicle reported Thursday.
In the statement to the JC, a spokesperson for the British public broadcaster said, “We apologise for the unacceptable delay and will ensure formal responses are issued as soon as possible.”
The apology comes more than a year after media monitoring group Camera accused the BBC of “normalizing Jew-hate” in 26 separate instances during its coverage of Israel’s war with Gaza-based terror groups in May 2021.
BBC responses to Israel-related complaints have taken up to a year, with many ignored entirely. In many cases, even when there was acknowledgement of factual errors, bias, or otherwise, no corrections were issued.
“The BBC’s complaint system is unable to meet its own standards when it comes to content in Arabic about Israel and Jews,” a spokesperson for Camera said.
The BBC’s own rules state that complaints are addressed within ten working days.
In one instance, the broadcaster took a year to acknowledge an error in a report about holy sites in Jerusalem, but the mistake remains online more than two months later.
A BBC spokesperson said: “We apologise for the unacceptable delay and will ensure formal responses are issued as soon as possible.”
Campaign Against Antisemitism dismissed the apology as “forced.”
“For years, the BBC has shown a disdainful attitude towards Jewish concerns and failed to engage with the community’s complaints,” the group said. “The rot has been festering for years.”
BBC News Arabic has an audience of 36 million globally. Its reporters are often criticized for their extremist views. One Islamist commentator, Abdel Bari Atwan, has openly celebrated Palestinian terrorist attacks against Israel.
Earlier this year, a top British rabbi resigned from the BBC after 30 years last week, citing the broadcaster’s “incurable antisemitism.”
The BBC was also ranked third on a “Global Antisemitism Top Ten” list by a major Jewish group, beaten only by Iran and the Hamas terror group.
Among the reasons cited was the BBC’s reporting of an attack by anti-Semitic Muslims hooligans giving Nazi salutes on a group of Jewish schoolchildren.
The BBC falsely reported a victim on the bus used an anti-Muslim slur. To date, the BBC has still failed to acknowledge the error.