SPECIAL REPORT: 5Pillars’ latest discrimination breach shines new light on its alarming content
As regulator Impress finds the Muslim news platform guilty of breaching discrimination rules for a second time this year, concerns grow over its content and far-right collaborations
Muslim media organisation 5Pillars has again been found guilty by the regulator Impress of breaching the discrimination clause of its Standards Code following a complaint from the Community Security Trust.
The verdict relates to an episode of the organisation’s Blood Brothers podcast and is the second guilty verdict Impress has handed down against 5Pillars this year.
The CST told Jewish News it “welcomes the ruling and the confirmation that 5Pillars had given an unchallenged platform to air their antisemitism”.
The latest ruling relates to an interview with former deputy leader of the far-right organisation Britain First, Jayda Fransen, by host Dilly Hussain in an episode entitled ‘Britain First, Christian nationalism and the Zionist agenda’. It has been found that Fransen was able to espouse antisemitic theories without pushback, encouraging hatred or abuse towards a specific group, in this case, Jews.
The Impress adjudication states: “The interviewee’s (Fransen’s) unchallenged assertions that Jews were responsible for Pornhub, for ‘the abortion industry’ and for ‘the LGBTQPZ plus agenda’, and that there was a ‘disproportionate number of Jews occupying positions of authority’, had the effect of perpetuating a narrative of prejudice against Jewish people.”
Rejecting the claim that providing more challenge to the interviewee would have made the podcast too long, Impress recognised “the publisher had full editorial control over the scope, content and duration of the item and had an obligation to ensure that, whatever its length, it complied with the Code. Overall, the committee considered that the lack of challenge by the interviewer to the claims enabled the interviewee to encourage hatred or abuse of Jews”.
While the complaint was upheld, Impress cannot take action because it oversees a voluntary system, one which 5Pillars has quit. It gave notice it was leaving the regulator in June but had previously regularly referred to its membership to promote itself as a legitimate media organisation.
A statement from Impress said that is “of course disappointed that 5Pillars came to the decision to leave Impress earlier this year”.
In a post on the website, editor Roshan Salih wrote: “Impress is no longer a suitable regulator for 5Pillars” and called for the establishment of a Muslim media regulator.
Run primarily by Salih (editor) and Hussain (deputy editor), 5Pillars describes itself as “a news, opinion and analysis-based website which concentrates on British Muslim news but also looks to the wider Islamic world”. It has built up a substantial audience across its website and social media platforms with 173,000 followers on Twitter and 200,000 subscribers on YouTube.
A browse of the website might lead a reader to think it is a mainstream outlet focused on Muslim community news and events. However, 5Pillars has often published content that can appear geared towards radicalising its audience.
Reaction to Hamas’ 7 October attack
Disturbing content published by 5Pillars seen by Jewish News during months of investigation includes a video posted on 8 October 2023 entitled “The Palestinian resistance go on the offensive”. It frames the 7 October terror attacks positively and downplays the horrors inflicted on women, children and elderly people on that day, falsely claiming these groups were protected.
That video also includes footage of Hamas propaganda, including official clips from the terror group’s Qassam Brigade and an image of terrorist wearing the emblem of its Air Force Falcon squadron.
The CST told Jewish News it “welcomes the ruling and the confirmation that 5Pillars had given an unchallenged platform to air their antisemitism
“There will come a time when the Palestinians, when the resistance, will decide strategically that it’s time to regain in as best way as possible the territories that were unjustly usurped from them,” the narrator warns towards the end of the six-minute video. He later adds that the 7 October attacks should be seen as a “natural progression in the strategies of a liberation movement and a religious prerogative to liberate Masjid Al-Aqsa”.
Content 5Pillars publishes appears to have real-world consequences. In January this year, disturbing scenes took place at an event being held by the charity Boys Clubhouse, which helps disaffected young men. After Hussain tweeted details of a talk being given there by IDF soldier Levi Simon, a group of hooded men turned up at the event in Hendon. Hussain, however, rejects that the actions were because of anything he posted.
There are worries that the content published by 5Pillars could lead to further such incidents. A policy expert explained to Jewish News: “You’re talking about a media which plays on people’s emotions and to encourage them to anger. This anger seems, in my view, to be taken out primarily against people who are identifiably Jewish.”
Blood Brothers podcast
Hussain broadcasts his Blood Brothers podcast on the alternative video platform Rumble as well as the 5Pillars website and major audio platforms like Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Some videos were previously removed by YouTube, likely because they violated the platform’s rules. Videos that remain display advertising sold by YouTube, generating revenue for 5Pillars.
In some episodes, Hussain opens the show by making a gesture as if he is pulling the trigger of a gun as he says the word “foes”.
As well as the episode with Fransen, there is also an edition of Blood Brothers with former BNP leader Nick Griffin.
It may seem an unlikely partnership, but Hussain and Griffin chat calmly, almost casually, talking about the former BNP boss’s views of Adolf Hitler, with Griffin downplaying the Nazi leader’s role in World War Two. “The usual banker, culprits, the French, a section of the British elite, all of them… were involved in creating that war, but Hitler made it inevitable there’d be that war,” claimed the former MEP.
He and Hussain even share a chuckle about the depiction of Oswald Mosely in the TV series Peaky Blinders. (Griffin goes on to praise the British fascist politician.)
Indeed, the far-right are rather prominent on 5Pillars. Christian nationalist Jim Dowson has appeared on the podcast and there has been an episode with the neo-Nazi Mark Collet, who runs the organisation Patriotic Alternative. That episode was the subject of the other complaint that was upheld by Impress this year.
There are other deeply troubling episodes too. One published in late December 2023 features Dr Azzam Tamimi. The academic and writer has previously made statements saying Israel “must come to an end” and professing: “I long to be a martyr.”
After a glowing introduction by Hussain, Tamimi says in his opening answer that “a fair-minded individual who knows the history of the conflict in that part of the world would not blame Hamas or any resistance faction for what that happened on 7 October”.
He adds that “it would be crazy to blame” Palestinians for the attack that murdered 1,200 people.
Further into the conversation, Tamimi says: “For a change, the Palestinians decided to take the initiative.”
In November 2023, Dr Abdul Wahid, the Harrow GP exposed as a leader of now proscribed organisation Hizb ut-Tahrir, was a guest on the podcast as was disgraced anti-Israel academic David Miller. Anti-Zionist Rabbi Elhanan Beck has also been interviewed.
Zionists and homophobia
Frequent references to “Zionists” can be found across 5Pillars content. The Chief Rabbi is referred to as “an outspoken supporter of Israel” in a report about his knighthood. That same article also mentions honours given to the “proudly Zionist” former oard of Deputies chair Marie Van der Zyl, as well as television presenter Rachel Riley. It is hard not to see the word Zionist as anything other than a substitute for “Jew”.
Other recurring themes include opposition to interfaith programmes in which Jewish and Muslim communities come together. This has been going on for years, with a 2018 article asking: “Why are Muslim organisations getting cosy with Zionists?”
The trigger for upset on that occasion was an initiative in which Jews and Muslims made chicken soup together. Indeed, Salih tweeted that the Mitzvah Day initiative was a “Zionist infiltration” of the Muslim community.
5Pillars has also faced scrutiny for homophobic content. It was handed a £3,000 grant from Public Interest News Foundation (PINF) from its Covid-19 Emergency Fund in 2020, but there was a backlash following the publication of a homophobic video. Pink News reported the broadcast called gay people a “gross crime against Allah”.
A PINF statement published at the time said: “We take extremely seriously the concerns that were raised about some of the material on the 5Pillars website and related social media accounts. PINF exists to promote active citizenship and community engagement by supporting public interest journalism with high standards. We do not wish to support journalism that does not provide a benefit to the public.”
That was another occasion in which Impress ruled the content broke its code and 5Pillars had to repay the grant. Now, though, the site is free of any media regulator.
Impress itself has urged change. “It is our strong belief that it is better for both publishers and the public that recognised independent regulation is taken up as widely as possible to preserve journalistic integrity across the sector,” it said. “Unfortunately, until there are genuine incentives put in place by Government and the industry for that to happen, publications will continue to be free to do as they please, including discriminating against protected groups with no recourse or consequence.”
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