On March 4th the BBC News website published a report by Alice Cuddy headlined “Israel tells people in large parts of southern Lebanon to leave ahead of attacks” in which readers were told that:
“In Beirut, strikes this week have largely targeted the Dahieh area, but one early on Wednesday hit a hotel in an upscale suburb in the east of the city.
Witnesses said one person had been taken to hospital with serious injuries.
Locals said they were shocked, describing the district as safe, with the hotel located in a Christian-majority area less than a mile from the presidential palace.
The Israeli military has not yet commented on the attack.”
The report also includes the following photograph:
The BBC News website live page that was active on the same day also included entries relating to the same story.
The BBC News TikTok account also posted a report from the scene by Wyre Davies.
Nearly three weeks later, on March 24th, the IDF announced the elimination of Muhammad Ali Kourani the previous day in Hazmieh.
“An Israeli Navy strike in Beirut yesterday killed a member of the Quds Force, the extraterritorial arm of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, the military announces.
The IDF says Muhammad Ali Kourani had been “advancing terror attacks directed by Iranian intelligence officials.””
Following that strike, footage emerged of Kourani at the Comfort Hotel on March 4th.
The absence of any follow-up reporting however means that the BBC’s online “permanent public record” continues to tell a context-free story about an Israeli strike on “a hotel in an upscale suburb” of Beirut that was accommodating “displaced people”.
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