The BBC has become embroiled in a new row over its coverage of Israel amid claims it allowed an Iranian academic to make ‘racist’ and ‘antisemitic’ comments without challenge.
The UK’s largest Jewish community organisation said it was ‘deeply concerned’ about the interview on the Today programme, between Mishal Husain and University of Tehran’s Mohammad Marandi.
Marandi described Israel as an ‘expansionist regime’ which believed in ‘ethno-supremacism’ and that ‘they are a chosen people’ who felt they had ‘exceptional rights’. He also described the events in Gaza as a ‘holocaust’.
After the interview aired, The Board of Deputies of British Jews put out a statement on social media raising concerns the comments were not properly challenged on the programme.
It said: ‘We are deeply concerned about our national broadcaster allowing such language to be transmitted via the airwaves without clear pushback. We will be raising this directly with the BBC at the highest levels.’
Mohammad Marandi described Israel as an ‘expansionist regime’ which believed in ‘ethno-supremacism’ and that ‘they are a chosen people’ who felt they had ‘exceptional rights’
The UK’s largest Jewish community organisation said it was ‘deeply concerned’ about the interview on the Today programme, between Mishal Husain (pictured) and Marandi
After the interview aired, The Board of Deputies of British Jews put out a statement on social media raising concerns the comments were not properly challenged on the BBC programme
Marandi, who was born in Virginia in the US before moving to Iran, previously acted as an adviser to Iran’s nuclear negotiations team.
Leading historian Simon Schama responded to the interview, saying the academic’s remarks were ‘antisemitic abuse’ and that it had been ‘appallingly offensive’.
Another historian Simon Sebag Montefiore called it a ‘racist rant’ filled with ‘lies, libels, conspiracy theories, fake facts, anti-semitic tropes and even distortion and misuse of Holocaust history’.
Both historians said the BBC interviewer had failed to properly counter his remarks during the interview.
The BBC responding to the row said the professor had been challenged in the interview but admitted ‘we accept we should have continued to challenge his language throughout the interview’.
The row comes after the BBC was accused of ‘systematic bias’ against Israel in a report labelled ‘profoundly troubling’ by the Chief Rabbi.
Leading historian Simon Schama responded to the interview, saying the academic’s remarks were ‘antisemitic abuse’ and that it had been ‘appallingly offensive’
Historian Simon Sebag Montefiore called it a ‘racist rant’ filled with ‘lies, libels, conspiracy theories, fake facts, anti-semitic tropes and even distortion and misuse of Holocaust history’
Smoke rises from a building following an Israeli military strike, in the southern suburbs of Beirut, Lebanon, 1 October 2024
Dramatic footage shows missiles exploding near Tel Aviv on October 1
Sir Ephraim Mirvis has backed calls for an independent inquiry after the report alleged the corporation made ‘false and damaging claims about Israel’s conduct’ in the war in Gaza.
On the Today programme, Professor Marandi, who is an Iranian-American academic, said of the current crisis in the middle-east: ‘The only way forward is resistance, because there is nothing that will stop this Israeli regime, because that is the nature of the regime.
‘It’s an expansionist regime. It believes in ethno-supremacism. It believes that they are a chosen people. They have exceptional rights, and therefore they have exceptional rights for the region.’
Schama, who regularly presents shows for the BBC, described the academic as ‘a servile apologist for the misogynist-theocratic tyranny’. He said Mr Marandi gave his ‘standard exterminationist antisemitic abuse’ that had been aired ‘without challenge’.
A BBC spokesman said: ‘The Today programme covered the latest developments in Lebanon and the Middle East and interviewed a range of people including IDF spokesperson Lt Col Peter Lerner, US Diplomat Dennis Ross and Iranian academic Mohammad Marandi to get a broad perspective on the complex politics of the region.
Chief Rabbi Sir Ephraim Mirvis has backed calls for an independent inquiry after the report alleged the corporation made ‘false and damaging claims about Israel’s conduct’ in the war in Gaza
A woman holds a sign in protest against the BBC’s coverage of the Hamas-Israel war on October 16, 2023, at the BBC HQ in London
The row broke out on the day that the BBC’s chief executive of news and current affairs, Deborah Turness, wrote a blog about the difficulties in covering the conflict
‘Mohammed Marandi was interviewed to gain an understanding of the view from Iran, and what their response is likely to be.
‘This was a live interview and he was challenged during the course of the interview, and the Israeli position was reflected.
‘However, we accept we should have continued to challenge his language throughout the interview.’
The row broke out on the day that the BBC’s chief executive of news and current affairs, Deborah Turness, wrote a blog about the difficulties in covering the conflict.
She said: ‘But if there is one thing we have learned more than any other in the past year, it’s that such is the depth of the polarisation in this war, so many have come to see impartial reporting as being somehow against them, because it does not solely reflect their view of the conflict.’
She said much of this was explained by ‘social media algorithms’ and ‘echo chambers’ that give consumers more of what they already ‘like’.
***
Read more at DailyMail.co.uk