Complaint
A listener complained about the programme’s coverage of an article in The Daily Telegraph which expressed concern about the International Criminal Court’s decision to issue an arrest warrant for Benjamin Netanyahu, “taken on the basis that Israel might have committed war crimes in its conflict with Hamas”. In the complainant’s view, it was self-evident from the television coverage of events in Gaza that war crimes had been committed, whereas the programme gave the misleading impression that the matter was up for debate. The ECU considered the complaint in the light of the BBC’s standards of accuracy.
Outcome
The ECU saw no requirement arising from the BBC’s standards of accuracy to treat allegations which had not yet gone to trial as established facts and found nothing misleading in a report which accurately reflected what The Daily Telegraph had said.
Not upheld