RSS
BBC Hits New Low in Repeatedly Comparing Israeli Hostages to Palestinian Terrorists

The BBC logo is seen at the entrance at Broadcasting House, the BBC headquarters in central London. Photo by Vuk Valcic / SOPA Images/Sipa USA via Reuters Connect
The media’s coverage of the release of the first three Israeli hostages from Hamas captivity was revolting.
Several major news outlets drew grotesque comparisons between well-fed Palestinian detainees — most of whom were jailed for violent and deadly offenses — and the visibly emaciated Israeli hostages Eli Sharabi, Or Levy, and Ohad Ben Ami, who spent 491 days underground, malnourished, and subjected to torture.
The false equivalence was so extreme that Israel’s Government Press Office (GPO) issued a statement condemning these attempts to blur the distinction between convicted criminals and their victims.
HonestReporting called out — and successfully secured corrections from — several international news organizations, including NBC News and The Washington Post, whose reporting fell below even the most basic ethical standards.
Many outlets we engage with are at least willing to correct their mistakes. Sometimes, these amendments, retractions, and clarifications take time, but they do happen.
Then there’s the BBC — the outlier.
Despite being funded by UK taxpayers via the television licensing fee, the BBC repeatedly refuses to engage with legitimate criticism of its biased Israel coverage — both before and since Hamas’s October 7 massacre.
Rather than ensuring accuracy before publication or promptly correcting errors, the BBC resists taking action until it is quite literally forced to — usually after an intense and coordinated backlash makes the misreporting impossible to ignore.
The result? Barely a month goes by without the BBC issuing a public correction and apology — a recurring embarrassment gleefully reported by UK media as yet another example of the broadcaster’s journalistic failures.
And the male hostage exchange was no exception.
First, the BBC was once again forced into a public apology after one of its news anchors, Nicky Schiller, referred to the three Israeli hostages as “Israeli prisoners” of Hamas. Hours later, the network issued an on-air correction and apology, calling it a mistake.
But what kind of honest “mistake” is immediately repeated within 24 hours?
The very next day, as the BBC covered the release of the three emaciated hostages — exchanged for 183 Palestinian prisoners — it ran a glaringly misleading strapline across the bottom of its live news coverage: “Concerns over [the] appearance of hostages on both sides.” [Emphasis added]
“Concerns over appearance of hostages on both sides” — @BBCNews.
There are no “both sides” here.
What a disgusting false moral equivalence between actual Israeli hostages held by Hamas & Palestinian prisoners jailed for terror offenses.
It’s the BBC. Why aren’t we surprised? pic.twitter.com/FbCUZTk7mC
— HonestReporting (@HonestReporting) February 9, 2025
Let’s set aside the fact that the appearance of three starved, brutalized Israelis sparked far more than mere “concerns” — with their skeletal frames drawing comparisons to Nazi concentration camp survivors.
Who at the BBC thought that this grotesque false equivalence between convicted criminals and innocent hostages was remotely appropriate?
And if anyone still believes these incidents were just “mistakes,” as the BBC insists, or mere sloppiness, fast forward another 12 hours to high-profile BBC anchor Laura Kuenssberg’s Sunday morning interview with Israeli President Isaac Herzog.
In a brazen display of false equivalence, Kuenssberg used the horrifying condition of the freed Israeli hostages as a springboard to push baseless allegations of abuse in Israeli prisons — a remark Herzog rightly called “outrageous” for its vile moral equivalence.
Here’s the clip that @BBCPolitics hasn’t posted:
Israel’s President @Isaac_Herzog calls out the BBC for its consistent attempts to create a false moral equivalence between Israel and Palestinian terrorists.@bbclaurak, where’s your moral compass gone? https://t.co/2TYxjfiw0y pic.twitter.com/XePm7iBkaI
— HonestReporting (@HonestReporting) February 9, 2025
By now, it’s abundantly clear: this isn’t a string of unfortunate editorial slip-ups.
This is a pattern.
Whether it’s drawing a grotesque equivalence between Israeli hostages and the terrorists who kidnapped them and murdered their families, or describing 9-year-old Emily Hand — who was violently abducted from her kibbutz on October 7 — as simply having “gone missing” (as the BBC did), the BBC has made its position clear.
Emily Hand did not simply go “missing from Be’eri,” @BBCNews.
She did not walk out of her kibbutz into Gaza. Hamas terrorists abducted her.
Why is it so difficult for the BBC to give agency to Palestinian terrorists? pic.twitter.com/a33NGEsC4x
— HonestReporting (@HonestReporting) February 10, 2025
This time, the BBC’s bias must be properly scrutinized.
The broadcaster has repeatedly defended its disgraceful coverage, particularly its insistence on “both-siding” the conflict in the name of so-called impartiality. But when “balance” means whitewashing terrorism and dehumanizing its victims, it’s time to call it what it is: a complete failure of journalism.
The corporation’s ongoing insistence on applying this warped notion of impartiality to Hamas — a terrorist organization banned in the UK, one that Britons are legally prohibited from supporting under the UK’s Terrorism Act — speaks volumes about the editorial decisions coming from the top.
Unless the BBC’s taxpayer funding is cut, this will not stop.
The truth is, the BBC is rotten to its core — and its audiences deserve better.
They deserve a public broadcaster that serves them, not one that sympathizes with the extremists who seek to destroy them and their way of life.
The author is a contributor to HonestReporting, a Jerusalem-based media watchdog with a focus on antisemitism and anti-Israel bias — where a version of this article first appeared.
The post BBC Hits New Low in Repeatedly Comparing Israeli Hostages to Palestinian Terrorists first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
RSS
German Authorities Warn of Potentially Violent Anti-Israel Protests in Berlin on International Workers’ Day

Anti-Israel protesters march in Germany, March 26, 2025. Photo: Sebastian Willnow/dpa via Reuters Connect
German authorities have warned of large-scale, potentially violent anti-Israel demonstrations expected to unfold in Berlin during the International Workers’ Day protests on Thursday.
Every year on May 1, workers’ rights are celebrated through demonstrations held around the world. In Germany, the day is marked by “Revolutionary May Day,” an annual protest organized by radical left-wing activists that often draws a broad coalition of groups and heightened police attention.
In a statement, the State Criminal Police Office (LKA) said they expect Thursday’s protest to center on tensions in the Middle East, with a particular focus on the war in Gaza, German media reported. Organized by anti-Israel activists, this year’s demonstration is being led under the slogan “Free Gaza.”
The demonstration is reportedly scheduled to begin at 6 pm in the Kreuzberg district, southeast of the city center, with organizers expecting more than 20,000 participants.
While Berlin police have historically kept the raucous protests under control for years, the LKA expects to focus this year on not only preventing and responding to attacks and vandalism across the city but also addressing terrorist propaganda and calls for the destruction of the state of Israel.
German law enforcement specifically issued warnings to journalists covering the protests on the streets, cautioning that they may be targeted with verbal and physical aggression.
In their statement, the LKA said past experience shows that “journalists and mainstream media are often viewed critically or even with hostility by the pro-Palestinian movement, being seen as part of the ‘lying press’ and allies of the West or ‘Zionists,’ with their work frequently obstructed.”
Before the Hamas-led massacres across southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, Berlin police had extensive experience with violent supporters of terrorism. However, since Hamas’s onslaught, anti-Israel sentiment has spread across Germany, fueling pro-Palestinian protests, takeovers of university campuses, and a rise in antisemitic incidents.
During last year’s protest, police deployed more than 7,000 officers, minimizing opportunities for violence. However, 34 arrests were made, with those detained charged with serious public disorder, bodily harm, and incitement to hatred, while five officers were injured during the incidents.
Compared to previous years, local police have noted a decline in unrest at these protests since 2021, when the “Revolutionary May Day” demonstrations led to 93 injured officers and over 350 arrests.
Germany has experienced a sharp spike in antisemitism amid the war in Gaza. In just the first six months of 2024 alone, the number of antisemitic incidents in Berlin, for example, surpassed the total for all of the prior year and reached the highest annual count on record, according to Germany’s Federal Association of Departments for Research and Information on Antisemitism (RIAS).
The figures compiled by RIAS were the highest count for a single year since the federally funded body began monitoring antisemitic incidents in 2015, showing the German capital averaged nearly eight anti-Jewish outrages a day from January to June last year.
According to the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), police registered 5,154 antisemitic incidents in Germany in 2023, a 95 percent increase compared to the previous year.
The post German Authorities Warn of Potentially Violent Anti-Israel Protests in Berlin on International Workers’ Day first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
RSS
NYC Police Head Off Anti-Zionist Protest After Black Residents Urged to ‘Rise Up Against’ Orthodox Jews

Nerdeen Kiswani, founder of WithinOurLifetime (WOL), leading a pro-Hamas demonstration in New York City on August 14, 2024. Photo: Michael Nigro via Reuters Connect
Anti-Israel activists attempted to swarm the Crown Heights neighborhood of Brooklyn on Monday night to protest “Zionism,” heightening safety concerns among the New York City borough’s Orthodox Jewish community.
Scores of pro-Palestinian agitators sought to descend upon the heavily Jewish neighborhood of Crown Heights, confronting visibly Jewish individuals, shouting obscenities, and throwing punches at counter-protesters. However, the New York City Police Department (NYPD) deployed officers to prevent the anti-Zionist activists from wreaking havoc.
As police vans and cars patrolled the streets, dozens of officers walked alongside the protesters’ route while streets were blocked by police on bicycles who cut off the path to Crown Heights, home to the headquarters of Chabad-Lubavitch, a Hasidic movement within Orthodox Judaism that operates around the world. Anti-Israel activists had called on protesters, especially Black local residents, to “rise up” against Chabad.
Jewish community watch groups, including Crown Heights Shomrim, joined patrols in the area.
Chabad-Lubavitch spokesperson Rabbi Motti Seligson said on social media that the protesters never made it to Crown Heights due to the NYPD deployments.
It was heartening to see scores of people, some Jewish and some not, who came to Crown Heights to protect the residents. These people weren’t looking for a fight. Some gathered in front of the synagogue at 770, others stood at strategic corners. Clearly this was not 1991. https://t.co/Mt29jpBprs
— Motti Seligson (@mottiseligson) April 29, 2025
The raucous demonstrations came after the Chabad-Lubavitch headquarters hosted Israel’s controversial national security minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir — who has called for annexing the West Bank and the emigration of Gaza’s residents — on Thursday night. Ben-Gvir’s visit drew large protests from anti-Israel activists who bellowed chants such as “from the river to the sea, Palestine will be free,” a slogan that has been widely used as a call for the destruction of the Jewish state, which is located between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea.
Jewish and pro-Israel counter-protesters met the demonstrators in Crown Heights, leading to clashes. In one incident, a mob of the counter-protesters chased and harassed a woman who they mistook for a participant in the anti-Ben-Gvir demonstrations.
Chabad-Lubavitch headquarters subsequently issued a statement denouncing the anti-Israel agitators and those who targeted the woman, reportedly a neighborhood resident in her 30s who was simply investigating the scene.
“The violent provocateurs who called for the genocide of Jews in support of terrorists and terrorism — outside a synagogue, in a Jewish neighborhood, where some of the worst antisemitic violence in American history was perpetrated, and where many residents share deep bonds with the victims of Oct. 7 — did so in order to intimidate, provoke, and instill fear,” Seligson said in a statement. “We condemn the crude language and violence of the small breakaway group of young people; such actions are entirely unacceptable and wholly antithetical to the Torah’s values. The fact that a possibly uninvolved bystander got pulled into the melee further underscores the point.”
Following the explosive clashes, a group called the Bronx Palestine Solidarity Committee issued a public statement on Instagram on Sunday urging black New Yorkers to target and harass members of Chabad-Lubavitch. The organization, which is an affiliate group of the anti-Israel group Within Our Lifetime, urged Black people in Brooklyn to target Orthodox Jews in the area.
“Waiting for the sleeping giant that is Carribean Brooklyn, who have long suffered abuse and oppression at the hands of the racist Zionist Chabad Lubavitch to rise up against them,” the group wrote, vowing to “flood the streets of Crown Heights to inform them Zionism is not welcome here.”
The Bronx Palestine Solidarity Committee continued, arguing that Orthodox Jewish landlords have “violently exploited” the Black residents of Brooklyn through collecting exorbitant amounts in rent to supposedly “feed their genocidal land grabs in Palestine.”
“What would happen if Caribbean Brooklyn brought that VYBZ Kartel Barclays energy with ferocity and tore down these f—king monsters!?” the statement continued. “We will flood the streets of Crown Heights to inform them Zionism is not welcome here. Free Palestine. Bring flags and keffiyeh.”
VYBZ Kartel is a highly popular Reggae artist within the Caribbean community. He performed to sold-out crowds at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York in April.
Crown Heights was also the site of infamous 1991 riots, in which Black New Yorkers targeted and attacked Jewish residences and businesses for three days. The riots, which were sparked by a fatal car crash involving a Hasidic Jew and two young black children, were largely motivated by an unfounded belief that Jewish New Yorkers received preferential treatment from city services.
Following the latest clashes near Chabad’s headquarters, Crown Heights Bites Back and other radical groups called for a meeting to plan for future confrontations, decrying protest organizers for not being prepared and calling on supporters to train for “defensive and offensive tactics.”
The group went on to describe Chabad as “Zionist Nazis” and Zionism as an inherently oppressive idea.
The post NYC Police Head Off Anti-Zionist Protest After Black Residents Urged to ‘Rise Up Against’ Orthodox Jews first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
RSS
Police Investigate After British Neo-Nazis Shock Pub With Swastika Cake to Celebrate Hitler’s Birthday

Illustrative: A police car is seen outside Victoria Station in Manchester, England. Photo: Reuters/Phil Noble
In the United Kingdom, the Greater Manchester Police (GMP) have started an investigation into potential crimes at a gathering of members of the British Movement, a neo-Nazi group, at the Duke of Edinburgh pub in Royston on April 19.
Photos from the organization’s Telegram channel showed participants holding Nazi banners, performing Nazi salutes, and eating a cake decorated with a swastika to celebrate Adolf Hitler’s birthday, which is April 20. One man in the group wore a German soccer jersey with “Fuhrer 44” on the back.
Law enforcement have confirmed they are reviewing for potential violations of Section 18 public order laws, which criminalize efforts to foment hate. “Police in Oldham are investigating reports that a group attended a pub on Market Street in Royton in possession of Nazi memorabilia,” a GMP spokesperson said.
The British Movement’s Northern Region wrote about the event, describing how “on a gorgeous sunny afternoon in Greater Manchester, a platoon of Northwest British Movement met up to celebrate the 136th birthday of Uncle A. It certainly didn’t take long for the dimly lit interior of the Oldham boozer to be filled with the warm laughter of comrades old and new. Tables were filled with a plethora of drinks: frosty pints of beer, fruity cocktails, schooners, and birthday cake!”
Employees of the pub did not know about the public display of Nazi symbols at the time, learning only afterward and prompting a report to the police.
“They said they had a cake, but we didn’t know what happened because they covered everything up,” Jean Anderson, who is taking over operations of the pub from her partner Terry English, told The Manchester Evening News. “The pub was full. There were about six to eight men and one woman. They sat in the corner and didn’t cause any problems. I have never seen them before, but they definitely won’t be coming in here again.”
English said, “I just can’t understand why they picked this pub.”
The Duke of Edinburgh’s operator, Craft Union Pubs, released a statement to The Independent, describing the British Movement group’s efforts to hide their offensive activities.
“A group entered the Duke of Edinburgh on Saturday under the pretext of celebrating a birthday and gathered in a back area of the venue. The group actively concealed their clothing and their activities during the visit and as a result, their actions were not visible to staff at the time,” the statement read. “The operator who runs the pub was therefore unaware of what had taken place until after the event. Upon becoming aware, the operator reported the matter to the police immediately.”
Craft Union Pubs added, “To be clear, we are absolutely appalled at what took place. We do not and will not tolerate this kind of behavior, and these people aren’t welcome in any of our venues. We are focused on uniting our local communities, not dividing them. We are supporting our operator to look after their team, who are understandably incredibly distressed by the incident.”
“There is absolutely no place in any civilized society for those who celebrate hatred and evil. Honoring Hitler is not an act of free speech; it is a shameless glorification of one of the darkest crimes in human history,” a spokesperson for the Community Security Trust (CST), a nonprofit charity that advises Britain’s Jewish community on security matters. told Jewish News. “Neo-Nazism must be unequivocally condemned, and we urge the police to investigate.”
The British Movement emerged in 1968. David Lawrence, senior researcher at Hope Not Hate, called it a “highly fringe Nazi group that is repulsive even by the standards of the far right.”
Lawrence explained that “the group is trying to raise its profile with small propaganda actions, especially in the North West, where its numbers have grown slightly due to the defection of activists from a larger fascist organization, Patriotic Alternative. The promotion of base racial hatred is always dangerous. However, the British Movement today is no closer to ushering in a new Reich than when it launched decades ago and remains a tiny collection of crank Hitler fetishists and washed-up hooligans.”
CST recorded 3,528 antisemitic incidents in the UK in 2024, the second-highest level ever seen. The group noted that “there were still 909 incidents reported to CST in 2024 where the Holocaust or Nazi era were invoked, comprising 26 percent of all incidents.”
The post Police Investigate After British Neo-Nazis Shock Pub With Swastika Cake to Celebrate Hitler’s Birthday first appeared on Algemeiner.com.