BBC News avoids the issue of Hamas-Qatar collaboration

On the afternoon of September 14^th the BBC News website published and promoted an oddly titled report:

Headlined “Rubio in Israel as IDF destroys more Gaza City buildings” and illustrated with footage filmed on a conveniently placed camera, that report is credited to Tom Spender. The version currently available online opens by creating some confusion as to the target of the September 9^th strike on a building in Doha used by the Hamas leadership: [emphasis added]

“Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said US-Israeli relations have “never been stronger”, as US Secretary of State Marco Rubio visits to discuss the war in Gaza following Israel’s attack on Hamas members in Qatar. […]

Earlier, Rubio said US President Donald Trump was unhappy with the Israeli strike on the key US ally, but stressed that the US-Israeli relationship was “very strong”.”

Spender goes on:

“In his remarks at Joint Base Andrews, Rubio added that Trump’s priority remained the return of all hostages and an end to the war. Hamas members had been in Doha to discuss the latest US proposal for a ceasefire in Gaza when Israel launched its strikes.

When asked whether the strike on Doha complicated Qatar’s willingness to work with the US, Rubio said “they’ve been good partners on a number of fronts”.”

The BBC’s report does not inform readers that one day earlier, a senior Hamas official had described that US proposal as “a humiliating surrender document”.

Remarkably, BBC audiences are not informed that some of those “Hamas members” are based in Qatar, which has hosted leaders of that terrorist organisation and its political bureau since 2012. No mention is made of their having filmed themselves there watching and giving thanks for the events of October 7^th 2023. The fact that days before the strike, some of the same Hamas leaders had met with the Iranian foreign minister in Doha is not reported.

In addition, readers are told nothing about Qatar’s financing of Hamas, its support for the Muslim Brotherhood or the fact that on October 7^th 2023 it put out a statement declaring that it “holds Israel solely responsible” for the Hamas massacre on that day.

Such omissions would be extraordinary in any case, but all the more so given that the writer of this report should be well able to provide such relevant context seeing as he previously worked for Qatar’s Al Jazeera – the channel which aired the then Hamas leader’s rallying call on the day of the terrorist group’s invasion of Israel.

Spender’s photo collection from his time in the Middle East includes an image taken in Hebron and labelled “Apartheid!”, without any mention of the Hebron Protocol signed by the PLO ten years earlier or the fact that Israelis do not have access to the 80% of the city of Hebron that is under Palestinian Authority control.

Perusal of Spender’s social media suggests that his interest in accuracy, impartiality and fact checking has not changed much since then. For example he recently reposted a misleading report by another Qatar funded outlet about the death of a man who suffered from cancer.

His other recent posts include promotion of an article criticising criticisms of the highly problematic IPC report.

He obviously considers the UN employee who came up with the ’14,000 babies’ lie worth quoting.

Spender also promoted the farcical ‘83% death toll’ claim.

With that level of interest in accuracy and impartiality (not to mention the BBC’s editorial guidelines on personal use of social media), it hardly comes as a surprise to find Spender promoting the narrative of famine later in his report.

“Netanyahu’s plan to occupy Gaza City has drawn international criticism, with the UN warning a military escalation in an area where famine has been declared will push civilians into an “even deeper catastrophe”. […]

Since UN-backed global food security experts confirmed a famine in Gaza City on 22 August, the ministry has reported that at least 144 people have died from starvation and malnutrition across the territory. Israel has said it is expanding its efforts to facilitate aid deliveries and has disputed the health ministry’s figures on malnutrition-related deaths.”

As pointed out by Salo Aizenberg, according to the IPC’s own methodology a “confirmed famine” would have resulted in 4,300 starvation deaths in that time period.

It is, however, clearly unrealistic to expect a BBC journalist so obviously committed to the promotion of partisan narratives to inform the corporation’s funding public of such inconvenient details or to provide them with the full range of information needed to understand the topic of Hamas-Qatar collaboration and how that influences the current conflict.