On the morning of September 29th a report by BBC Verify on the topic of the elimination of Hassan Nasrallah and other Hizballah commanders two days earlier appeared in two sections on the BBC News website’s ‘Middle East’ page.
As can be seen in its synopsis, no fewer than six BBC employees are credited with the production of that one-minute and forty-two-second filmed report which does not provide any information that was not already available in the public domain.
“Israeli strikes on Friday, which are now known to have killed Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, concluded a week of Israeli strikes on southern areas of the Lebanese capital, Beirut.
BBC Verify’s Merlyn Thomas has been analysing numerous videos shot from multiple vantage points to investigate the incident.
Lebanese officials say 11 people were killed and 108 injured in strikes on Friday in Beirut, adding that nearly 800 people have been killed in Israeli strikes in Lebanon since Monday.
Produced by Jemimah Herd and presented by Merlyn Thomas.
Additional reporting by Paul Brown, Emma Pengelly, Richard Irvine-Brown, and Kris Bramwell.”
Presenter Merlyn Thomas began by telling BBC audiences that: [emphasis in italics in the original, emphasis in bold added]
Thomas: “As the sun was setting over Beirut on the 27th of September, the city was rocked by a series of large explosions. It concluded a week of Israeli strikes on southern areas of the capital.”
Notably, Thomas had nothing at all to tell viewers about why Israel would conduct strikes on that particular district in Beirut: the fact that the Iranian proxy terrorist group Hizballah has for years used the densely populated Dahiya suburb as its stronghold and command centre was clearly not considered relevant by the BBC Verify team.
Thomas continued:
Thomas: “Here are four that BBC Verify has confirmed.”
The dates on screen are September 20th (elimination of Ibrahim Aqil and other top Hizballah commanders), September 23rd (attempted elimination of Ali Karaki), September 24th (elimination of Ibrahim Qubaisi and other Hizballah commanders) and September 26th (elimination of Mohammed Srur) but viewers are told nothing about the reasons for those “Israeli strikes on southern areas of the capital”.
Failing to note that the Lebanese authorities do not differentiate between Hizballah operatives and civilians, that Israel began Operation Northern Arrows on September 23rd or that Hizballah is rather more than just a “group”, Thomas went on:
Thomas: “The Lebanese health ministry says that hundreds of people have been killed by Israeli airstrikes across the country since the 23rd of September. Israel says its intended target in its strike on Friday was Hizballah leader Hassan Nasrallah. His death has now been confirmed by the group.”
She continued:
Thomas: “Dramatic footage of the strikes flooded social media in the immediate aftermath, which our team at BBC Verify were analysing to establish their precise location. Verification like this is key to our understanding of a developing story, as well as helping to root out old or misleading footage which regularly emerges online during major events.”
Thomas then presented several short clips of video footage, concluding:
Thomas: “Based on the surroundings, we could confirm that these multi-storey buildings were struck and subsequently collapsed.”
In addition to information about the location of those buildings in the Haret Hreik neighbourhood of the Dahiya suburb , BBC audiences’ understanding of the story would of course have benefitted from being told of the Hizballah command centre located underneath them and perhaps even some background information on the relevant topic of Hizballah controlled building companies that were sanctioned by the US years ago. The fact that Hizballah’s command centre was located in the vicinity of a UN-run school would also have been helpful to audience understanding of the story.
However, such relevant information would of course have detracted from Merlyn Thomas’ editorialising parting shot:
Thomas: “Israel says it’s targeting weapons and members of Hizballah. But in doing so, its strikes are causing death and destruction in Lebanon.”
As previously documented here, just days earlier BBC Verify had published another filmed report which likewise airbrushed from the story the crucial issue of Hizballah’s placement of military assets in civilian areas – and resulting use of civilians as human shields.
Over the past year we have seen time and time again that the May 2023 claim from the CEO of BBC News that BBC Verify had been set up for the purpose of “fact-checking, verifying video, countering disinformation, analysing data and – crucially – explaining complex stories in the pursuit of truth” [emphasis added] was little more than a hollow sales pitch.
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