The revelation of basic flaws in BBC’s TV Documentary ‘Gaza How to Survive a Warzone’ is unfortunately unsurprising. This most recent example is part of a systemic issue affecting BBC News and Current Affairs that is vividly illustrated by its reporting of Israel and the Palestinians but is not confined to it.
This is a matter of personal disappointment. I was privileged to work for the BBC, spending many years reporting from the Middle East for the Corporation. I felt very proud to work for an organization that was in my eyes a byword for fairness and excellence.
But the current standing of BBC journalism is at odds with those values. The issues it faces go far deeper than a failure of due diligence for what a contracted production company, along with the BBC itself, did or did not do in the making of the documentary. This episode demonstrates an embedded failure by the Corporation through an interlocking combination of elements that have undermined its once vaunted editorial standards. These include the demands for a constant stream of content, limited resources, weak management, poor oversight, and a lack of instruction for journalists who often are working with a pre-determined or activist mindset.
This is not about whether a piece of journalism works in favour of Israel or the Palestinians but rather if it is loyal to the BBC’s editorial standards. Its reporting should be about telling the story without fear or favour and letting the facts lead. But too often over the past 16 months, the BBC’s journalism seems to have decided upon the story in advance of the facts, invariably seeing Israel as the guilty or less credible party.
I left the BBC in 2007 and at that time, the demands upon News and Current Affairs were growing exponentially. Where a correspondent would once report for just radio or television, they were now being asked to do both, as well as supply copy for on-line outlets. The ability to independently verify and check stories became increasingly difficult with the time pressure, leading reporters to depend upon external sources such as news agencies. And what was happening for correspondents on the ground was also true for staff in London
Screenshot: BBC
BBC Online is now the centerpiece of the Corporation’s news operation for both home and foreign news, getting hundreds of millions of visits a month. It is a global brand, bringing with it enormous soft power and influence. Eight out of ten British adults use BBC News services on average per week — way ahead of rivals such as Sky News and ITV News. Huge efforts go into churning out fresh content before others to expand its appeal. BBC Online sends out ‘push notifications’ for new stories, and regularly runs attention grabbing live news segments on the front page. Every effort is made to win and keep the audience’s attention by getting there first.
But this comes at a price. A former senior BBC news executive told me he worries, ‘that this is coming at the expense of accuracy and careful consideration of its guidelines’.
At the same time, resources are increasingly limited. I have seen a steady stream of former colleagues with decades of experience leaving the BBC because of budget cuts. Those still there say that attending leaving parties has become a regular ritual. According to The Times, over 1800 journalists received redundancy payments in 2021 and 2022 and staff numbers in News are reportedly less than there have ever been. Institutional memory and experience, a vital asset for BBC journalism, has been lost.
This is compounded by the fact that instruction for journalists, once a rite of passage, is now virtually absent. BBC World Service Training, where I briefly worked, became part of a wider BBC School of Journalism established in 2005. But this was closed a few years later with journalism training brought into a new ‘BBC Academy’, offering optional online courses.
Last year I looked into what this meant and was told by a BBC spokesperson, that training is now, ‘skills based rather than focusing on editorial matters and is provided based on needs identified for individuals which is agreed with line managers.’ According to journalists who are busy editing and outputting stories for BBC online, this means that there is de-facto, no editorial instruction. Broadcast journalists can walk in the door of the BBC without a clear understanding of how its journalism is meant to work.
At BBC World Service Training, I would instruct staff in checking sources, sequencing events, reporting casualty figures and more. Also having left the BBC I worked as an external consultant in preparing an online module to guide BBC journalists in covering the Israeli/Palestinian conflict. It stressed the importance of checking and re-checking information, where it was coming from, how to order events, how to describe the protagonists, place names and more. The module along with other training is now a thing of the past.
A further factor influencing coverage is the motivation of staff. The former senior BBC executive who I spoke to described the growing social activism of younger journalists as, ‘an issue that the BBC and other broadcasters who are bound by impartiality, are definitely struggling with’.
Among those younger journalists he had encountered, they would say impartiality is about fairness which is about social justice.’ People he spoke to asked how they could be expected to report genocide or racism impartially. I have been told that this has been translated into activism by some staff members via different WhatsApp groups pushing editors and even directly contacting presenters for a more assertive – i.e. partial – reporting of the conflict in Gaza.
People are of course entitled to hold an opinion. But the problem is where that viewpoint is allowed to enter into their work in defining news coverage for our national – public service – broadcaster. The absence of training is compounded by a lack of oversight, which for many comes from the top of BBC News. A current well-known figure working in News told me that, ‘the bosses are frightened’ of standing up to staff members.
This lets down the numerous producers, editors, and correspondents who work tirelessly to report the story from Gaza and Israel as faithfully as they can according to the BBC principles of impartiality. It is difficult to get it right and mistakes are made despite the best of efforts.
Israeli soldiers operating in Gaza, July 2024. Credit: IDF
The institutional failings of BBC News also add fuel to those who have their own agendas in attacking the Corporation. This includes politicians as well pro-Israeli and pro-Palestinian advocates who either want to undermine the BBC as a whole or see its journalism comply with their viewpoint.
The best defense for the BBC is to seriously address what has led to the current situation, and to understand the extent of the problem. A mea culpa is insufficient. There has to an inquiry, and based upon that, practical measures to bring editorial standards back up to where they once were. This means better oversight, training, and journalistic rigour. Maybe the Corporation needs to do less with its limited resources and ensure that what it does, it gets right. Hard choices and decisive actions need to be taken to recover the BBC’s standing.
What happens with Israel and the Palestinians is a lightning rod for passions here and around the world and the reporting of it comes with responsibility. That – apart from anything else – is why the BBC must have a long hard look at what has really gone wrong and to act.
- Richard Miron is a former BBC reporter, UN Middle east spokesman and senior World Bank communications official.
