On January 8th terrorists in the Gaza Strip launched a rocket towards Israel which fell short, landing near a hospital. The launch site in Gaza City was targeted shortly afterwards and additional strikes in response to that failed rocket attack were carried out later in the day.
On the evening of January 8th, the BBC News website published a report by Jon Donnison titled “Eight people killed by Israeli air strikes, Gaza civil defence agency says”. Donnison failed to clarify to BBC audiences that the organisation cited in his headline and opening paragraphs is run by Hamas or that “the agency’s spokesman” who supplied the second-hand quotes that he amplifies is a Hamas operative.
“At least eight people, including four children, have been killed by Israeli air strikes in Gaza in the last 24 hours, the territory’s civil defence agency has said.
Four people, including three children, were killed when a drone struck a tent sheltering displaced people in southern Gaza, the agency’s spokesman Mahmud Bassal told AFP.
An 11-year-old girl was killed near the Jabalia refugee camp and a strike on a school killed one person, he said, while a drone killed a man near Khan Younis and another was killed in an Israeli strike on Deir al-Balah.”
The target of the “strike on Deir al-Balah” was the head of a Hamas workshop for weapons manufacturing called Ahmed Thabet. Another strike – apparently the one that Donnison describes as having taken place “near Khan Younis” – targeted Kamal Abd al-Rahman Muhammad Awad, head of Hamas’s anti-tank array. In addition, a terrorist called Ahmed Abd al-Fatah Said Majdalawi who took part in the massacre at the Nova festival on October 7th 2023 was also targeted.
Unsurprisingly, given that Donnison clearly relied solely on inadequately presented Hamas sources, the fact that the “eight people” cited in his headline and opening paragraph included Hamas terrorists is not revealed to readers of this BBC report.
Notably, the failed rocket attack that prompted the later strikes is only mentioned in paragraph six of Donnison’s report – without any mention of its having landed near a hospital – and the connection between the events is not clarified:
“Earlier on Thursday, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said a projectile was launched towards Israel from the area around Gaza City but that it fell within the Gaza Strip.
The military said it then “precisely struck the launch point”.”
Donnison does however repeatedly promote a particular narrative – including in two consecutive and repetitive paragraphs:
“Both Israel and Hamas have accused each other of breaching a fragile ceasefire in Gaza.”
Given that the BBC has largely ignored the issue of violations of the ceasefire by Hamas and other terrorist organisations since it came into effect, it is hardly surprising that Donnison fails to inform BBC audiences that the IDF reported 79 such violations between October 10th 2025 and January 8th 2026 or that three IDF soldiers have been killed as a result of those breaches.
Donnison does however promote a claim from “Gaza’s health ministry” – again without telling readers that it is a Hamas body and without clarifying that its claims cannot be verified and deliberately do not distinguish between civilians and combatants:
“Israeli forces have killed at least 425 Palestinians in Gaza since the latest US-brokered truce took effect on 10 October, according to Gaza’s health ministry.”
Clearly the BBC’s funding public – apparently including a UK government minister – was not provided with the full range of information necessary to understand and “engage fully” with the events that Donnison purports to report.
The heads of the snakes are the international news agencies, AP, Reuters, AFP (the worst), all knowlingly employ Hamas operatives as their sources. You just need to look at the credits below any photos or film footage. I’m sure Camera can trace them