The BBC constantly agonises over balance in its Middle East coverage, but does not always get it right, according to one of its leading correspondents.

The Corporation’s religious affairs specialist Caroline Wyatt told a packed session that her colleagues were “always accused of bias by almost everyone”, when covering Israel and the Palestinians. “There’s a genuine attempt to get it right and I don’t think we always do,” she acknowledged.

“Looking at the coverage of the Gaza conflict last summer, I think the people reporting it tried harder than I’ve seen before to use language that was not loaded. Jeremy Bowen, Lyse Doucet and others are trying their best to report as impartially as they can. It’s a difficult one.”

The former defence correspondent said she had been shocked to meet British Jews who told her they felt unsafe in this country in the light of rising antisemitism. But she said a “turning point” may have been reached in how religion is reported by the media.

“Faith plays a huge part in people’s lives,” she said. “Religion does still matter and it’s shaping the world in ways we probably didn’t expect it would in 2014.”

Ms Wyatt also reflected on covering the 50th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz in 1995, which she said had deeply affected her. “What I saw there will never leave me. Elie Wiesel was speaking and it’s the only time I’ve ever seen a room full of journalists fall silent. I looked around and everyone had tears streaming down their faces.”