On the evening of July 27th the BBC News website began reporting a breaking news story about a Hizballah missile attack on a football field in the town of Majdal Shams in the northern Golan Heights.
Although that report has been amended several times since its initial appearance, certain themes are constant throughout.
The initial version of the uncredited report was headlined “Nine dead in rocket attack on Israeli-occupied Golan – reports”. The fact that those killed were children from Israel’s Druze sector and that the attack was perpetrated by the terrorist organisation Hizballah was obviously considered to be of less importance than political signposting concerning ‘occupation’.
The link provided in that final sentence – promoting equivalence between the terrorist organisation which launched an unprovoked attack on Israel on October 8th and the sovereign country defending its citizens – takes readers to an unhelpful report by Orla Guerin from southern Lebanon dated July 17th.
As we see, already in the initial version of this report the BBC found fit to promote denials put out by Hizballah (despite its having earlier claimed the attack) after the identity of the victims became clear. Interestingly, BBC Persian’s Nafiseh Kohnavard had put out the following Tweet less than two hours after the attack.
Kohnavard does not clarify whether or not she followed the BBC editorial guidelines instructions concerning mandatory referrals before approaching “an organisation (or an individual member of an organisation) designated a ‘terrorist group’ by the Home Secretary under the Terrorism Acts”.
The headline of the next version of the report stuck to the same ‘occupation’ promoting template: “Ten dead in rocket attack on Israeli-occupied Golan”. That version of the report likewise promoted Hizballah denials.
“The IDF blamed Hezbollah for the attack but Hezbollah spokesman Mohamad Afif denied “any relation to the Majdal Shams incident”.
“All accusations [of the group’s involvement] are false”.”
Readers were told that:
“The attack followed an Israeli strike on Lebanon that killed four militants. Hezbollah fired rockets in response to that, but denied involvement in the Majdal Shams attack.”
Readers were not told that the strike on the four members of Hizballah’s Radwan force took place at a weapons depot in Kfar Kila – one of the locations featured in a recent BBC report about “damage” and “destruction” in towns in southern Lebanon.
Readers of that version of the report were also told that:
“Majdal Shams is one of four villages in the Golan where about 25,000 Druze people live.
They were offered Israeli citizenship when the Syrian Golan Heights was annexed in 1981, but most refused. They can study and work in Israel, but not vote.”
In fact, around 20% of the Druze residents of the Golan Heights are Israeli citizens, with the rest holding the status of permanent residents. At the last Israeli election in November 2022, 1,338 of the 11,604 residents of Majdal Shams were eligible to vote.
The next version of the BBC’s report also adhered to the ‘occupation’ talking point with the headline “Eleven dead in rocket attack on Israeli-occupied Golan”. Once again the identity of the victims and the perpetrator were secondary to BBC promotion of political framing.
The report again promoted the Hizballah spokesman’s denials, adding:
“But before the reports of the strike’s impact emerged, Hezbollah had claimed responsibility for four attacks, including one on the headquarters of the Hermon Brigade in the Ma’ale Golan barracks.
This followed an Israeli attack on Lebanon that killed four militants.”
Readers were not informed that despite Hizballah’s claim, an attack on the Ma’ale Golan barracks did not place.
That version of the report introduces more political signposting concerning the Golan Heights:
“The vast majority of the international community do not recognise Israel’s annexation of the area.”
The headline to the next version of the report – still uncredited – read “Children dead in attack on football pitch in Israeli-occupied Golan”.
“Eleven children and young adults have been killed and 19 others injured after a rocket hit a football pitch they were playing on, in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights, Israeli authorities say.”
In addition to promoting Hizballah’s denials of responsibility for the incident, that version of the report also floated disinformation: [emphasis added]
“Hezbollah spokesman Mohamad Afif denied responsibility for the attack, and the BBC is trying to verify reports that the militant group told the United Nations that the explosion was caused by an Israeli interceptor rocket.”
Notably, that disinformation was also promoted on social media by the BBC Persian correspondent Nafiseh Kohnavard:
Readers of this version were told that:
“Before reports of the strike’s impact emerged, Hezbollah had claimed responsibility for four other attacks.
One was on the military headquarters of the Hermon Brigade, on the slopes of Mt Hermon, which lies on the border between Israel and Lebanon. The base is around 3km (2 miles) from the football pitch.”
Once again readers were not told that despite Hizballah’s claim of responsibility, an attack on the Hermon Brigade HQ did not take place.
This version of the report also included the following confusing statements:
“Most Druze live in northern Israel, Lebanon and Syria. In Israel, they have full citizenship rights and comprise about 1.5% of the population.
They were offered Israeli citizenship when the Golan Heights was annexed from Syria in 1981, but only a minority accepted.”
And once again, political messaging was promoted:
“The vast majority of the international community does not recognise Israel’s annexation of the Golan Heights.”
The version of the report which currently appears online carries a typical BBC ‘last-first’ headline: “Israel hits Hezbollah targets after football pitch attack kills 12 young people”.
Credited to no fewer than three BBC journalists – Paul Adams, Barbara Plett Usher and Ido Vock – that version of the report also cites “additional reporting” by a London-based journalist called Mallory Moench who joined the corporation in May of this year.
The report begins by mentioning strikes conducted the night after the attack, including on weapons stores.
“Israel’s air force says it has hit Hezbollah targets in Lebanon, after 12 children and young adults were killed in a rocket attack while playing football in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights. […]
Early on Sunday, the IDF said it had conducted air strikes against seven Hezbollah targets “deep inside Lebanese territory”. It is unclear whether there were any casualties. […]
.. the Israeli Air Force said it had struck “terror targets” including “weapons caches and terrorist infrastructure” overnight.”
Like all its predecessors, this version of the report promotes Hizballah denials, along with the disinformation seen in the previous version:
“Israel has blamed the Lebanese militant group for Saturday’s attack on the Druze town of Majdal Shams, but Hezbollah has strongly denied any involvement. […]
Hezbollah spokesman Mohamad Afif denied responsibility for the attack, and the BBC is trying to verify reports that the militant group told the United Nations that the explosion was caused by an Israeli interceptor rocket.”
Had the four credited BBC journalists been keeping up with Israeli media reports, it would know that no interceptor rockets were launched in this case because of the difficult terrain and the rocket’s low trajectory.
That Hizballah propaganda is presented on an equal footing with factual information concerning the fatal incident.
“IDF spokesman Daniel Hagari, who visited the scene of the attack, accused Hezbollah of “lying and denying responsibility for the incident.”
He said that the rocket was an Iranian-made Falaq-1 “owned exclusively by Hezbollah”.”
Readers are not told that the Iranian-made rocket has a 50kg warhead or that the IDF has identified the site of its launch as being near the Lebanese village of Chebaa (Shebaa).
Neither are BBC audiences informed that Hizballah’s original claim of responsibility for an attack on the Ma’ale Golan army base stated that the attack had been carried out using “one Falaq missile”.
The report recycles the information appearing in previous versions concerning Hizballah attacks, once again failing to clarify that the claimed strike on the army base did not take place.
“Before reports of the strike’s impact emerged, Hezbollah had claimed responsibility for four other attacks.
One was on a nearby military compound on the slopes of Mt Hermon, which lies on the border between the Golan Heights and Lebanon. The base is around 3km (2 miles) from the football pitch.”
The report links to a statement from UNIFIL – presented as coming from the UN – but avoids any mention of the relevance to the story of that UN body’s failure to implement UN Security Council resolution 1701 throughout the past 18 years.
“A UN statement said “maximum restraint” was crucial by all parties, with the risk of a wider conflict that would “engulf the entire region in a catastrophe beyond belief”.”
As in the two previous versions of the report, this one also promotes political messaging in its final sentence:
“The vast majority of the international community does not recognise Israel’s annexation of the Golan Heights.”
Given that the various versions of this BBC report repeatedly prioritised political statements concerning ‘occupation’ and ‘annexation’ over informing BBC audiences that twelve children had been brutally murdered by the Iranian proxy terrorist organisation Hizballah, it is hardly surprising that it provoked considerable public outrage. Together with its promotion from the outset of Hizballah denials, along with blatant disinformation, the BBC’s coverage of this story demonstrates an attempt to prioritise framing over fact which is also evidenced by its now standard failure to provide audiences with any information whatsoever on the topic of the UN SC resolution which should have prevented this massacre from taking place.
Reading their blurb makes you wonder if the BBC news dept. have employees that are members of Hamas, Hezbollah, the Houtis and the IRGC, you could not invert the truth, lie and misinform and show much more bias to the general public much more if you tried. Totally going against the terms of their royal charter#defundthebbc
Reply to Neil C
Yes they are – look at the BBC details of employees to detect a pattern.
What about Knell who reports from Jerusalem, not a Jew or Israeli, but a UK citizen married to an Arab from Beit Safafa in Jerusalem!
How many of the BBC correspondents who report from Israel – guess – ZERO – it says it all!
Crumbs; cry-baby Barbara Plett Usher, the beeboid who cried on-air while reporting the funeral of the late boy-buggering terrorist Yassir Arafat, is still on the job! You can bet she is not crying now, after 12 children have been blown to bits by an Iranian-made missile.
But then, the corrupt BBC has a soft spot for child molesters like the late unpunished 50-year employee Sir Jimmy Savile and the late Rolf Harris, among others.