Another member of the Independent Alliance of MPs used the occasion to claim that the corporation’s coverage was actually biased in favour of Israel
February 27, 2025 17:39
An independent MP elected on a pro-Gaza platform has linked criticism of a recent BBC documentary about Gaza to “Netanyahu’s policy of collective punishment” during a parliamentary discussion.
Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone, was pulled from all BBC platforms after it emerged that its English-speaking narrator, 13-year-old Abdullah Al-Yazouri, is the son of Ayman Al-Yazouri, a senior official in the Hamas-run Gaza government, something initially undisclosed.
But Leicester South MP Adam suggested that “children...cannot be held accountable for the actions of their parents” following an Urgent Question on the matter today.
Adam said that “We all agree that the BBC’s impartiality is imperative and that antisemitism is abhorrent” but added: “Is it not enough that we have stood by as 48,900 Gazans have been killed, including 17,400 Gazan children?”
He went on: “Is it not enough that we have stood by as 320 aid workers and 162 journalists have been killed? Does the Secretary of State agree that children, and the narrator of this show specifically, cannot be held accountable for the actions of their parents, or is this just an extension of Netanyahu’s policy of collective punishment of the Gazan people?”
Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy responded by saying: “If the child in question is related to senior Hamas officials, that is important context for viewers to understand. Not to inform the public about that context falls way short of the standards we would expect of our national broadcasters.”
Elsewhere, Iqbal Mohamed, independent MP for Dewsbury and Batley, used the occasion to call on the government to “investigate and address the unacceptable and biased anti-Palestinian and pro-Israel reporting by the BBC since October 7”.
Earlier in the session, Nandy updated MPs following her meeting with the BBC’s director general Tim Davie on Tuesday.
She said she’d demanded urgent answers from the corporation’s top boss, including “cast-iron assurances that no money paid has fallen into the hands of Hamas and that the utmost care was taken to ensure that that was the case.”
The Culture Secretary promised to keep MPs informed “about the findings of the internal BBC investigation” into the documentary.
Nandy described Hamas as “a terrorist organisation guilty of heinous acts of terrorism over many years, including the appalling terrorist and antisemitic attacks carried out on October 7, 2023.”
Responding for the Conservatives, Shadow Culture Secretary Stuart Andrew criticised the BBC and said that they only decided to pull the documentary “after a significant public backlash”.
He also lamented that on “at least five occasions, the words ‘Yahud’ and ‘Yahudy’—Arabic for ‘Jew’ and ‘Jews’—were changed to ‘Israel’ and ‘Israeli forces’”, a practice previously defended by BBC figures.
A BBC spokesperson previously told the JC that “Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone features important stories we think should be told – those of the experiences of children in Gaza.”
They continued: “There have been continuing questions raised about the programme and in the light of these, we are conducting further due diligence with the production company. The programme will not be available on iPlayer while this is taking place.”