Complaint
The programme included an interview with a former Israeli Ambassador to the US, following the end of the ceasefire in Gaza. A listener complained that the interviewee had not been sufficiently challenged on the human cost of the resumption of hostilities and the Palestinian perspective on events. The ECU considered the complaint in the light of the BBC’s editorial standards of impartiality.
Outcome
In the ECU’s judgement the interview was conducted in an appropriately challenging manner and, although its focus was primarily on the pressures on the Israeli government and what they meant for the prospects for peace, reports immediately preceding it would have made listeners amply aware of the humanitarian implications of the end of the ceasefire, while those reports, together with an item later in the programme, also served to give listeners a sense of the Palestinian perspective on events.
Not upheld