BBC’s Bateman tweets simplistic claim about Jerusalem eviction case

On July 11^th the BBC Jerusalem bureau’s Tom Bateman Tweeted the following:

The BBC’s latest guidance on individual use of social media includes the following instruction for those “working in news and current affairs (across all Divisions) and factual journalism production…”:

“Do not sacrifice accuracy for speed. Second and right is always better than first and wrong – an inaccurate post is a problem for you, your colleagues and the BBC.”

Bateman’s claim that the Sub Laban family were evicted from an apartment “they’ve lived in for decades” does not by any means tell the whole story. Details of that long-running case were provided by CAMERA in 2015:

“The family’s failure to move back into the building following extensive, drawn-out renovations complete in 2001 jeopardized their status as “protected tenants.” […]

…the Sub-Labans were never the owners of the property, but rather enjoyed “protected tenant” status. That status can be lost if the tenant abandons the property without intention of returning – and it is irrelevant whether the tenant is Jewish or Palestinian. […]

The magistrate court (34656-11-10) in a decision upheld by the district court (28083-12-14) found that the family had not returned to the apartment in 2001. According to the court from 2001-2010 (when the property was transferred to the trust) the family did not live in the apartment. From 2010 until 2014, they had only “pretended” to live in the apartment.”

In 2016 CAMERA reported further developments in that case.

Tom Bateman’s simplistic portrayal of that story clearly misleads his 16.3 thousand followers. Twitter users would however not have been able to point that out to him because the BBC’s Jerusalem correspondent prefers to restrict replies to his Tweets rather than be corrected on the kind of inaccuracy described in the BBC guidance as “a problem for you, your colleagues and the BBC”.