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Victory
07-05-06, 02:05
BBC ignored report of Israeli news bias for 3 years-research group
Thursday May 04, 2006

BBC-Middle East Coverage

Glasgow University Media Group Thursday questioned why it took the BBC over three years to confirm that there was an overwhelmingly bias in its domestic output towards Israel in its news coverage of the Middle East conflict.

"The question is: why has this situation been allowed to continue and what will the BBC now do to offer a better informed coverage," said Professor Greg Philo of the research group.

His challenge comes after a report by an independent panel commissioned by the BBC's governors this week found that Britain's state-funded broadcaster failed to give a "full and fair account" of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Many viewers were found not fully understand the conflict and judged the BBC's coverage to be "inconsistent" and "misleading" because it did not always provide a "complete picture" of the situation.

The report concluded that that national news programmes reported six times as many Israeli as Palestinian fatalities contrary to the fact that it is the Palestinians who have suffered significantly more casualties.

"In our study - Bad News from Israel - three years ago we found that there was a strong emphasis on Israeli casualties in TV reports, even though deaths on the Palestinian side were much higher," the professor said.

In a letter to the Guardian, he said that the consequence was that in a large audience sample from 2002, just 35 per cent knew that the Palestinians had significantly more casualties, while 43 per cent believed either that there were more Israeli casualties.

"We showed how such reporting could strongly influence attitudes, leading, for example, to the belief that Palestinians were instigating violence while the Israelis "responded," Philo said.

Following this week's report, the Council for Arab-British Understanding also called on the BBC to rectify many of the points raised about its coverage of the Middle East.

"Only by doing that will concerns about the partiality of their coverage be erased," said Caabu director Chris Doyle.

"When research consistently shows that fatalities from one side of a conflict, the party that has by far the least number, are more frequently covered, then this must raise alarm bells," he said.

The latest report also found that there was a "failure to convey adequately the disparity in the Israeli and Palestinian experience, reflecting the fact that one side is in control and the other lives under occupation."
Doyle said that there was also concern about the frequent absence of the key term, occupation, has been a continuing in BBC news items that was of "serious concern."

mark61
08-05-06, 01:55
Das nou wat ik tegen de BBC heb. Ze liegen niet, maar vertellen ook niet de waarheid.