The BBC caved in to criticism and announced on Friday its journalists would no longer use “militants” as the “default” term when it comes to addressing Hamas. While it is understood the word may still be used to describe members of the terror group, the publicly-funded broadcaster will address Hamas as a group “proscribed as a terror organisation by the UK Government and others”.
This comes after the broadcaster was widely criticised by members of the public, politicians and even Isaac Herzog, the President of Israel, for its stance on the word “terrorist”.
Since the horror attack launched on Israel by Hamas on October 7, Jewish groups have accused the BBC of showing “double standards” by refusing to describe it as a “terrorist” assault while the broadcaster’s journalists had in the past called “terrorist attacks” other atrocities.
Guidelines enshrined in 2018 argue using the words terrorism or terrorist without attribution conveys “value judgments”, going against the BBC’s impartiality stance.
A BBC Spokesperson said: “The BBC regularly meets a range of groups and today met the Board of Deputies of British Jews. During the meeting we confirmed that we will continue to refer to Hamas as a proscribed terror organisation by the UK Government and others. What the BBC does not do is use the word terrorist without attributing it, nor do we ban words. We also confirmed that for some days we had not been using ‘militant’ as a default description for Hamas, as we have been finding this a less accurate description for our audiences as the situation evolves.”
FOLLOW THIS LIVE BLOG FOR UPDATES ON THE WAR
