Murder glorified, racism unchecked — BBC failing to moderate its Arabic social media
Celebrating Hamas, cheering Israeli deaths and urging arson: new report exposes obscene levels of unmoderated hatred on corporation's platform
BBC Arabic is failing to moderate hateful comments on its social media channels which include glorification of Hamas terrorist violence and death, according to new research.
In the last four months, the CAMERA Arabic watchdog organisation has found multiple examples where the publicly funded BBC Arabic language channel has taken no action to remove highly concerning comments on stories relating to Israel. These include Hamas hostage releases, a terrorist attack in Haifa, Kibbutz Nir Oz reconstruction after the 7 October massacre and recent wildfires around Jerusalem.
Responses to a BBC video on the reconstruction of Kibbutz Nir Oz posted on BBC Arabic’s Instagram page, which contained footage of more than 300 terrorists storming the area on 7 October, included “300 resistance heroes it’s their homeland” and “Wait a while, all of Palestine will be hell and grave for you”, along with the red triangle which is associated with Hamas marking its targets. Another stated “Raise children in a land that is not yours? Raise your children in a stolen land? U deserve what happened to you and more.”
After a terror attack in Haifa, in which an Israeli Druze man attacked people with a knife, killing one and injuring four, responses to the BBC Arabic Facebook post on the story included “Praise be to Allah”, “A hero of the Druze”, and, in reference to Israelis, “May God increase their sorrows”.
A video of one of the Hamas hostage releases published by BBC Arabic on Instagram saw responses such as “Victory from God. Congratulations, heroes, and mercy and forgiveness to our heroic martyrs”, and “I swear to God, the feeling of pride and victory despite the sacrifices and destruction”, again accompanied by the Hamas red triangle.
Alongside multiple responses celebrating the wildfires in Israel and calling on God to “increase their sorrow”, there were examples of direct incitement. One post, addressed to “our people in the [West] bank, Jerusalem and inside” said “This is your day, the fires are widespread, the entity is confused, head to the trenches near the settlements, set the parks and vehicles on fire, they are now in their worst state, frightened…seize this opportunity.” Another read “… burn them and make them wish for death.”
The BBC’s own editorial guidelines state, regarding content moderation, that “Although each platform has its own terms and conditions governing user behaviour, we should not rely entirely on the platforms themselves to manage communities on BBC spaces. We need to take overall responsibility and ensure user behaviour is in line with audience expectations for individual BBC brands.”
The guidelines say that “Moderation of comment threads should generally be light touch but abusive behaviour will not be tolerated, particularly when it takes the form of personal attacks or offensive language.” Among the possible solutions to this issue, the editorial guidelines suggest that “We might turn off comments on sites where we can; not post risky content on sites where comments cannot be blocked; or ensure we have additional moderation resources for potentially difficult content”.
Danny Cohen, former director of BBC television and controller of BBC One, said: “This is further evidence that BBC Arabic is failing to uphold the standards expected of the BBC. The racist and murderous comments, along with support for a terrorist organisation, have no place on a BBC service.”
CAMERA has made an official complaint to the Corporation. A spokesperson for the watchdog said: “The BBC still refuses to critically address the broader phenomenon of bigotry and support for violence against civilians in Arabic digital media, which is going far beyond the national broadcaster’s own backyard.
“A widespread social illness which is normalized throughout the Arab world, this hatred warrants a kind of journalistic coverage which BBC Arabic consistently avoids providing. In this sense, settling for these occasional cleanups also means acting as though the bigger problem does not exist.”
This is not the first time the BBC has been found to have fallen short with regards to content moderation on its Arabic Channel. In 2022 the Corporation admitted failures in effectively moderating user comments, after a CAMERA report found hundreds of examples of comments glorifying terrorist violence in response to BBC Arabic social media posts.
The BBC has received significant criticism of its treatment of BBC Arabic post-7 October, particularly in its treatment of journalists for the channel who were found to have made or shared comments celebrating the mass murder carried out by Hamas.
While initially suspending these staffers, the Corporation later allowed them to return to their jobs, which in a number of cases involved direct reporting on Israeli actions.
Last week Samir Shah, chairman of the BBC, confirmed that the BBC’s Arabic service is to be the subject of an independent review.
Andrew Gilbert, vice president of the Board of Deputies, said: “BBC Arabic is a constant concern, source of complaints and regular base for inappropriate content. It does not seem have appropriate levels of safeguards or oversight. It is right that, following our engagement on the issue, the BBC has agreed to include BBC Arabic in the scope of its independent thematic review of coverage of the conflict since 7 October. In the meantime, the BBC should substantially improve oversight and vetting of contributors, to ensure impartiality. Across all platforms, it needs to call Hamas what it is: a proscribed terrorist organisation”.
A spokesperson for the BBC said: “These comments are abhorrent. We strive to moderate comments on social media posts as quickly as possible or close the comment feature where possible.
“In common with many other media companies, we face issues with comment moderation on social media sites. Although we deploy filtering software, this doesn’t always identify problems the way we wish, so much of our moderation is manual and requires a lot of resource, but when such comments are brought to our attention, we take action.”
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