Urgent Call on BBC: Investigate the antisemitism at the network

 

More than 200 people from Britain's TV and film industry have called for an urgent investigation into allegations of antisemitism at the BBC, according to a report in The Independent on Thursday.

Fulwell 73 managing partner Leo Pearlman, who was an executive producer on the 2021 musical film “Cinderella”, former BBC One controller turned Telegraph columnist Danny Cohen, and former ITV executive Claudia Rosencrantz are among those who signed a letter to members of the BBC Board, the report said.

The letter says that “208 BBC staff, contractors, suppliers and contributors from across the television and film industries, the majority of whom are Jewish,” are in “anguish and disbelief” that previous complaints about coverage and social media breaches amid the Israel-Hamas war have not been dealt with.

“We all work in the film and broadcast industries. But we are also members of the wider British Jewish community and can vouch with certainty that there is a loss of faith in the BBC within our community and a widespread opinion that, when it comes to racism and discrimination at the BBC, ‘Jews don’t count,’” the letter says.

“By contrast, we are certain that were similar incidents to occur at the expense of any other minority, the BBC would show zero tolerance. And with this volume of incidents as documented in our three attachments, they would certainly be worried they might have a serious, institutional racism problem,” it adds, according to The Independent.

“We write to you today to request an urgent formal investigation by the BBC Board into systemic problems of antisemitism and bias at the BBC, alongside senior management’s demonstrable failure to properly address the issue.”

The BBC has repeatedly been criticized for the blatant anti-Israel bias in its reporting and this criticism has increased since Hamas’ October 7 attack on Israel and the war in Gaza which followed.

In November, the corporation published an apology after falsely claiming that IDF troops were targeting medical teams in battles in and around the Shifa Hospital in Gaza.

Before that, the BBC falsely accused Israel of being responsible for an explosion at a hospital in Gaza, which the IDF proved was caused by an Islamic Jihad rocket.

The network later acknowledged that “it was false to speculate” on the explosion.

In wake of the criticism, BBC Chair Samir Shah said in December that he intends to review the corporation’s reporting guidelines on the Israel–Hamas war.

More recently, the BBC apologized after one of its senior presenters suggested that Tel Aviv, not Jerusalem, was Israel’s capital.

Thursday’s letter references previous documents, which were sent to BBC chairman Samir Shah in July, in which the group claims there have been multiple breaches of the BBC’s social media guidelines.