Early on the morning of September 1st the BBC News website published a report titled “Israel says bodies of six Hamas hostages recovered” which was presented on its ‘Middle East’ page as follows:
Readers of that original version of the report credited to London-based Jaroslav Lukiv had to get past that confusing headline and the first five paragraphs in order to find out – though not in the BBC’s own words – that the story is about six Israeli hostages who had been murdered by Hamas.
“Israel says its forces have recovered the bodies of six hostages held by Hamas in the Gaza Strip.
In a statement, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said the bodies were located on Saturday in an underground tunnel in the Rafah area.
The IDF named the hostages as Carmel Gat, Eden Yerushalmi, Hersh Goldberg-Polin, Alexander Lobanov, Almog Sarusi and Master Sgt Ori Danino.
US President Joe Biden said Mr Goldberg-Polin was an American citizen. “I am devastated and outraged,” Mr Biden said.
In its statement on Sunday morning, the IDF said the bodies had been “returned to Israeli territory”.
“They were all taken hostage on 7 October [2023] and were murdered by the Hamas terrorist organisation in the Gaza Strip.””
Despite the information being available in the public domain, the BBC’s report did not clarify that the murders had taken place not long before the bodies were found.
That report underwent various amendments throughout the day and the version currently appearing on the BBC News website is credited to Jaroslav Lukiv and Adam Durbin and headlined “Israel recovers bodies of six Gaza hostages”.
Readers of that version of the report find a statement from a representative of the terrorist organisation which murdered the six hostages after nearly eleven months of captivity placed on equal footing with a statement from a representative of the forces that rescued their bodies:
“Israel says its forces have recovered the bodies of six hostages held by Hamas in the Gaza Strip.
In a statement, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said the bodies were located on Saturday in an underground tunnel in the Rafah area of southern Gaza.
The IDF named the hostages as Carmel Gat, Eden Yerushalmi, Hersh Goldberg-Polin, Alexander Lobanov, Almog Sarusi and Master Sgt Ori Danino.
Spokesman Rear Adm Daniel Hagari said an initial assessment was they were “brutally murdered by Hamas terrorists shortly before we reached them”.
A senior Hamas official, Izzat al-Rishq, insisted Israel was responsible for their deaths, as it has refused to sign a ceasefire deal.”
Despite the fact that the report clearly states that the hostages’ bodies were discovered in a tunnel in the Rafah area, no mention is made of the fact that a live hostage was rescued nearby just days earlier or that in February, two hostages were rescued from a building in Rafah. That omission is of course particularly relevant given that in its extensive coverage earlier this year of what was at the time a potential IDF operation in Rafah, only three of 28 items published by the BBC made any mention of hostages and only two mentioned tunnels:
BBC FRAMING OF A STORY THAT HAS YET TO HAPPEN
Also notable is the fact that this BBC report refrains from informing BBC audiences that six other hostages previously retrieved from a different location were also found to have been murdered by Hamas:
NO BBC FOLLOW-UP ON STORY OF SIX HOSTAGES
The BBC’s report does however go on to extensively promote statements from a variety of Israeli sources blaming the Israeli government (rather than the terrorists who murdered them) for the deaths of the six hostages and for the failure to reach what is erroneously described as “a hostage exchange deal”.
Apparently the BBC is quite happy to promote the false notion of equivalence between convicted Palestinian prisoners – including many serving lifetime sentences for murdering Israelis – and Israelis abducted and held hostage since October 7th.
Relatedly, readers find the following statement: [emphasis added]
“A Bedouin Arab man rescued in Gaza last week by Israeli troops urged Israel to reach a deal with Hamas to free all the remaining hostages.
After returning to his village in southern Israel on Wednesday, Kaid Farhan Elkadi said his “happiness is not complete as long as there are detainees” on both sides.”
That link takes readers to a report credited to George Wright and Jaroslav Lukiv which appeared on the BBC News website on August 28th under the headline “Rescued Israeli pleads for hostage deal with Hamas” and includes the following:
“After returning to his village in southern Israel on Wednesday, Mr Elkadi said his “happiness is not complete as long as there are detainees” on both sides.”
Obviously readers could interpret that portrayal of Farhan Al Qadi’s words as referring to Israeli and Palestinian “detainees”. However, as reported by the Times of Israel and others, he was actually talking about hostages of different ethnicities:
“Looking pale and taking in the spotlight, the 52-year-old told the gathered press that he feels “100 percent,” while urging the government to reach a deal to bring home all the hostages.
“The place I was in — I wouldn’t wish on anybody. So do everything — demonstrations, everything — to get the people home,” he said. “It doesn’t matter if they are Arab or Jewish, all have a family waiting for them. They also want to feel the joy.””
That linked August 28th report by Lukiv and Wright also tells readers that:
“Indirect talks to broker a ceasefire and the release of hostages have continued in Cairo in recent days, but so far there has been no sign of a breakthrough over key sticking points. They include Mr Netanyahu’s demand that Israel keep troops along Gaza’s border with Egypt, which Hamas has rejected.”
For months BBC framing of ceasefire negotiations has downplayed Hamas’ role and airbrushed its stance, while promoting the narrative that Israel is to blame for the failure to reach an agreement. As we see, even though this report is supposedly about the recovery of the bodies of six hostages held by Hamas for nearly eleven months before being brutally murdered, its writers nevertheless devoted almost half its wordcount to yet more promotion of that distorted framing.
