On March 24th a BBC Swahili live page ran with this heading:
That live page includes the following entry:
Notably, that report fails to inform the BBC World Service’s Swahili speaking audiences that in addition to working for Al Jazeera, Hossam (also Hussam) Shabat was a Hamas operative – specifically a sniper in the Beit Hanoun Battalion – as was revealed by the IDF last year.
Another BBC World Service foreign language department – BBC Arabic – published a report about Hossam Shabat on March 25th which includes the following:
“The Israeli military said Tuesday that the Al Jazeera journalist who was “liquidated” in Gaza—referring to Shabat—was a “terrorist sniper fighting in the ranks of Hamas.” […]
Last October, Israel accused Shabat and five other Al Jazeera journalists of belonging to Hamas and Islamic Jihad, charges Shabat denied, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists , a US-based nonprofit organization.”
BBC Arabic has in the past promoted claims made by Hossam Shabat. In January 2024 the BBC Arabic website published a report titled “What happened to some of the cemeteries in the Gaza Strip?” which includes the following:
“We spoke with Hussam Shabat, a 23-year-old journalist and resident of Beit Hanoun. He is also one of the few Palestinians who was able to return to the city and photograph the cemetery, despite what he described as the “heavy” Israeli presence in the area, which has turned it into one of the most “dangerous” places for Gazans.
The BBC team verified the photos and videos posted by Shabat, and in the background of one of the photos, bulldozer tracks are clearly visible in the cemetery ground.”
In other words, while the BBC “verified” photos and videos, it apparently did not bother to verify its contributor’s background.
A BBC Arabic live page dating from December 2023 included the following entry:
Shabat was also quoted on the same day in an entry written by Rushdi Abualouf on a BBC News website English language live page.
BBC audiences would probably have found it helpful to know that they were getting their news from a Hamas sniper but as has been documented here in the past, the corporation (like others in the industry) has repeatedly avoided addressing the serious topic of the abuse of the profession of journalism by people actively involved in terrorism.
BBC NEWS STICKS TO THE NARRATIVE AFTER ‘JOURNALISTS’ EXPOSED
BBC NEWS IGNORES AL JAZEERA JOURNALISTS STORIES
MORE BBC PROMOTION OF AL JAZEERA NARRATIVES AND MESSAGING
The avoidance of that topic is an even greater cause for concern given that – as it has made clear on many occasions – the BBC has been working with local journalists in the Gaza Strip on a freelance basis for almost a year and a half.
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THE BBC, JOURNALISM AND TERRORISM
Yet more reasons for shutting down this pro Islamic (so called British) news channel called the BBC. Every aspect of their claims about impartiality and even handed reporting have been debunked now for twenty years. Time it was shut down completely and time the BBC had a Christian head of programming having had Muslim ones for the last 18 years