The BBC has apologised for broadcasting an appeal by convicted Hamas terrorist Ahlam Tamimi in response to concerns raised by CFI Officer Bob Blackman MP and the families of Tamimi’s victims.
A segment of the BBC’s Arabic TV programme “Trending” featured a report on how Tamimi had called into a Jordanian radio station to appeal to King Abdullah II to intervene after her husband’s Jordanian residency was revoked earlier this month.
Tamimi masterminded the 2001 Sbarro Pizza parlour bombing in Jerusalem. 15 Israelis, including 8 children, were murdered in the attack. She was released from an Israeli prison as part of the Gilad Shalit prisoner exchange in 2011 and now lives freely in Jordan. Her husband, Nizar Tamimi, was also released in the Shalit prisoner exchange after being convicted of terrorism for murdering an Israeli student in 1993.
Mr Blackman wrote to BBC Director General Tim Davie last week, asking for “clarification on the BBC’s editorial guidelines for such coverage”. He called on the BBC to “immediately seek to remedy the situation by removing the videos from YouTube and apologising to the families of Tamimi’s victims”.
“Giving a platform for Tamimi’s appeal to be reunited with her husband is understandably deeply distressing for the families of her victims, who will never be reunited with their loved ones”, the MP for Harrow East said.
The former chairman of the BBC, Conservative peer Lord Grade, said that there were “very serious issues of balance and impartiality raised” by the broadcast and the corporation, and possibly Ofcom, should investigate.
The Director of the BBC World Service, Jamie Angus, said in response to Mr Blackman that an editorial review “found that this segment was in breach of our editorial guidelines” and confirmed that the video clip had been removed from the BBC’s digital platforms.
“I apologise for the lapse in our editorial standards”, he wrote, adding that “the appropriate lessons” would be learned “across our editorial teams”.
Mr Angus said: “As you point out, Ahlam Al-Tamimi has been convicted of serious crimes and is therefore not a suitable subject for this kind of item. I am afraid the programme team did not follow the correct BBC procedures by failing to refer the matter to the BBC’s Editorial Policy team or to senior editors in BBC News Arabic. Had they done so, the segment would not have been authorised for broadcast”.
Arnold Roth, the father of 15-year-old Malki Roth who was killed in the Sbarro bombing, said the BBC had “misplaced their moral compass” and that the family had not received an apology.
