BBC Bias Alert: Justifying and Humanizing Terrorist Murderers

The BBC elicits sympathy for Palestinian terrorists.

By Simon Plosker February 02, 2012

Having minimized Shammasina’s crimes, the BBC gives him ample space to justify his actions while painting him as a victim. While the dead Israelis are simply statistics, the humanizing of a murderer even extends to Shammasina’s “frail” mother and his family situation:

Out of one of the bedrooms steps Ibrahim’s frail 85-year-old mother, Tamam. While he was in prison, Ibrahim’s brother, father and wife all died.

With both Shammasina’s lack of regret and his mother’s open support for his murder of Israelis, this is certainly no exposé of the warped values of terrorists. Instead, the BBC offers further justification for terror, interviewing Abdul Hakim Abdul Aziz Abd Hanaini who served 20 years for making explosives for use by terrorists:

Abd Hanaini insists that taking up arms against Israel was the only option he had.

“At that time, when we resisted the occupation with arms, we were young, young men,” he says.

“I saw with my own eyes the killing of children, the killing of women, and the destruction of our olive groves, the occupation and burning of the land. This made us feel that we had to defend our families, our children, our women.”

In one feature article, the BBC has successfully humanized terrorists while justifying murder, ostensibly as a result of “occupation”. Would the BBC humanize or sympathize with convicted murderers in the US, UK or elsewhere, let alone even give them a platform? Of course not. So why then, does the BBC deem it acceptable to treat Palestinians involved in murder differently?

We’d like to hear the BBC’s answer to that very question. Send your complaints through the BBC Complaints website – www.bbc.co.uk/complaints. For detailed instructions on how to navigate the BBC Complaints website, click here.

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© Divuach Ne’eman R”A, 2025

Simon Plosker

Simon Plosker

With over two decades of experience in various non-governmental organizations in the UK and Israel, Simon Plosker returned to HonestReporting in October 2022 as Editorial Director having previously been part of the organization’s management team from 2005 to 2020.

Prior to his first spell at HonestReporting, Simon worked in Israel for NGO Monitor, BICOM, and served for a short period in the IDF Spokesperson’s Unit. He was Managing Editor of the Geneva-based NGO United Nations Watch for two years before moving back to the frontline defending Israel from media bias.

Simon has a BSoc.Sc in International Studies and Political Science from the University of Birmingham and an MSc in History of International Relations from the London School of Economics. He immigrated to Israel in 2001 from London.

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