The Centre for Media Monitoring (CfMM) sounds like such an official, well-intentioned and professional organisation with the purpose of ensuring integrity in journalism. In reality it functions as a political attack dog, created by the Muslim Council of Britain to bully journalists, enforce pro-Islamist guidelines across UK media, and erode the concept of objective truth by manufacturing fake counter-narratives and pumping them out on social media platforms.
The Claim of BBC ‘Pro-Israel’ Bias
A couple of weeks ago the CfMM published a report claiming that the anti-Israel BBC actually carries a strong pro-Israeli bias (seriously!). The report spanned 188 pages, and claims to have been positively reviewed by known political campaigners such as Alistair Campbell.
With the lightest level of critical thought, the entire CfMM argument falls apart. Almost all of the headline statistics are misleading and deceptive. This suggests that the CfMM report was not produced by an organisation seeking to hold media to a more professional standard. The reverse appears to be true: the CfMM created a deceptive, biased, and flawed political document cleverly dressed in the language of data in order to bully the media into adopting the CfMM’s antizionist narrative.
In the ‘reviewer comments’ section, Baroness Warsi referred to the report as an ‘evidence-based indictment’. Owen Jones called it a devastating ‘exposé’ of a ‘scandal’. Having now gone through the report in detail, I find it hard to believe any of the reviewers actually read it.
Misleading CfMM Headlines: The 33x Statistic
Let’s take the key misleading headline as a primary example. The CfMM claims that overall, Israeli deaths received 33 times more coverage than Palestinian ones.
It was this statistic that gave rise to many of the outrageous articles written about the report (clearly, none of these journalists actually read the report properly either).
The CfMM’s core methodology is built around counting ‘mentions’ of Israeli versus Palestinian deaths. But almost every BBC article about the Gaza conflict includes a boilerplate closing paragraph noting that the war began when Hamas killed about 1,200 Israelis on October 7 2023. This boilerplate isn’t new reporting or emphasis; it’s standard contextualised framing, repeated across hundreds of articles. The CfMM appears to treat this generic boilerplate as a full ‘mention’ of Israeli deaths, thus giving it equal weight to an article entirely focused on Palestinian casualties.
This leads to a ridiculous outcome because if the CfMM’s algorithm doesn’t filter out boilerplate text or adjust for article intent, the result is junk research; the BBC could publish 1,000 articles, each 1,000 words long and overwhelmingly critical of Israel, and the CfMM would still count them as giving equal attention to the casualties on both sides (1:1), simply because of the repeated boilerplate paragraph. Since around 33 times more Palestinians died than Israelis during the report’s timeframe, this errant 1:1 ‘finding’ provides the CfMM with a distorted metric to generate its misleading “33x” headline figure.
This is not just childish methodology, it’s a calculated manipulation that badly misrepresents reality to fit a predetermined narrative.
A message was sent to the CfMM after the report’s launch asking whether this was indeed the methodology they had used. The CfMM never responded.
Other Misleading CfMM Headlines
Once you understand that the CfMM has produced something so fundamentally deceptive – whether by design or through embarrassingly amateur oversight – it becomes clear the entire report is untrustworthy nonsense. Many of its so-called ‘headline’ statistics are equally absurd, and some even imply the BBC should abandon all professional standards. Take, for example, the headline complaint about the use of the word ‘massacre’:
This is presented as another key metric supposedly ‘proving’ pro-Israel bias, yet it proves nothing of the sort. It is an undisputed fact that, of the approximately 1,850 Israelis killed in conflict since Oct 7, around 1,200 people were killed in a single event: the October 7 massacre. All but about 70 were Israeli. If over 60% of Israeli deaths occurred in one clearly documented, widely reported mass killing of civilians, and no comparable event exists on the Palestinian side, then of course the term ‘massacre’ appears more frequently in reference to Israeli victims. Comparing the use of the word between the two sides is not just misleading – it’s nonsense.
The same is true of this next ‘key statistic’. Almost all uses of terms like ‘barbaric’ would only be correctly used to describe the Hamas slaughter of October 7, 2023.
The CfMM Demand for Unprofessional Journalism
This CfMM demand – that the BBC abandon basic professional standards – dominates the report. A striking example is their complaint about the BBC’s use of the phrase ‘Hamas-run Health Ministry’ when citing casualty figures from Gaza. The CfMM claims this language ‘undermines’ Palestinian deaths:
“Delegitimizing casualty numbers: the BBC attached the ‘Hamas-run’ qualifier – (i.e., ‘Hamas-run health ministry’) to Palestinian casualty figures in 1,155 articles – almost as many times as the Palestinian death toll was mentioned across BBC articles – thereby undermining Gazan casualties and Palestinian suffering, more generally.”
Saying ‘Hamas-run’ isn’t bias, it’s responsible journalism. The BBC is simply informing readers that these figures come from a source controlled by a proscribed terrorist organisation. They’re not disputing the numbers outright, but clearly attributing them. That’s not an editorial choice, it’s a basic requirement of transparent reporting.
The fact that the CfMM views this as a problem says far more about their standards than the BBC’s. If the CfMM considers Hamas a neutral or trustworthy source of information, that’s not a journalistic argument. It’s an inexcusable political position masquerading as media critique.
Objecting to the Fundamental Principles of Journalism
The CfMM also appears to object to the BBC including Israeli voices to explain or deny allegations. These are presented in the report as examples of supposed bias. In some cases, it seems the CfMM is even criticising BBC journalists for offering clarification or context after airing an unverified, inflammatory allegation, as if providing the other side’s response is a breach of impartiality:
- ‘To be clear, Israel has vehemently denied any intention or any actions involving genocidal intent.’ (p.74)
- ‘Israel would deny that genocide is taking place and that it is defending its right to exist.’ (p.74)
- ‘You will know that Israel says it is not breaking international law.’ (p.69)
- ‘The Israelis would say we are defending ourselves. Targeting Hamas targets, trying to put an end to what we believe is a terrorist organisation once and for all.’ (p.69)
In other words, the CfMM is objecting to the BBC reporting Israel’s position, something that is not only standard journalistic practice, but a basic principle of fair and balanced coverage. What CfMM is actually demanding is the removal of Israel’s right to reply. This is not just bad faith, it’s a fundamental misunderstanding of how journalism works.
Ignoring Important Context
It is possible to dismantle almost every single metric the CfMM uses.
This next example reveals how they deliberately omit key context. The CfMM claims that during a January 2025 hostage exchange, more BBC articles focused on Israeli hostages than on the 90 Palestinian prisoners who were released in return. They presented this as another headline statistic:
For the moment let’s set aside the fact that the CfMM appears to be demanding equal coverage between Israeli hostages dragged from their homes by radical Islamist terrorists and held in tunnels for 15 months, and the Palestinian prisoners they were exchanged for.
There’s a more immediate point to address. The CfMM provides a ratio of three Israelis to 90 Palestinians, which makes it clear they are referring to the January 19 exchange. But here’s the catch: one of the released hostages was Emily Damari, a British citizen who endured over 470 days in Hamas captivity.
It’s unclear why the CfMM fails to acknowledge the importance of this, or why they don’t think it’s appropriate for the UK’s national broadcaster to devote additional attention to the release of a British hostage.
This kind of omission – where a perfectly obvious and reasonable explanation is sidelined in order to imply sinister intent – is typical of the CfMM’s method. It’s not just misleading; it appears deliberately manipulative. If they’re willing to ignore basic facts like this, why should we trust anything else they’ve presented?
CfMM’s Cherry-Picking and Ignoring of Reality
On page 37, the CfMM discusses the death of Muhammad Bhar, describing it as an IDF dog attack on a civilian with Down’s Syndrome. The complaint targets a passive BBC headline and claims the report ‘overshadowed’ Palestinian suffering. The CfMM also criticises the inclusion of the standard IDF statement: ‘the Israeli military says it was attacking Hamas militants hiding among civilians,’ a routine and necessary element of balanced reporting that the CfMM repeatedly takes issue with.
However, rather than demonstrating any ‘pro-Israel’ bias, BBC coverage of this incident was so skewed against Israel that it prompted a formal complaint from the Israeli Embassy. Both of the victim’s brothers were terrorists hiding in the home, prompting the IDF to send in dogs before entering (a standard military tactic intended to reduce risk to soldiers). While the death of a civilian, particularly one with a disability, is deeply tragic (and the exact circumstances remain contested), the CfMM’s framing ignores crucial context and presents an incomplete and misleading narrative.
Hiding the Terrorist Links
On page 138, the CfMM highlights the death of the family of Al Jazeera journalist Wael Al-Dahdouh. What the report omits is that over 20 members of Al-Dahdouh’s family, including his brother, have been buried with honours by Islamic Jihad. Part of his family took part in the October 7 massacre. His son was a confirmed Islamic Jihad operative. And his cousin, Khaled Al-Dahdouh, served as one of the group’s senior military commanders until he was killed in a targeted strike by Israel.
Islamic Jihad has held annual ceremonies honouring the Al-Dahdouh ‘martyrs’, and the clan has a dedicated memorial website which documents these connections. This is an image of Zia Kamal Al-Dahdouh – Wael attended his nephew’s funeral in 2021 and publicly thanked Islamic Jihad for honouring him.
In another example (page 139), the CfMM accuses the BBC of bias for failing to report the death of the ‘journalist’ Hossam Shabat, framing it as further evidence of a ‘serious tendency’ to ‘underreport attacks on their fellow journalists in Gaza.’
However, the Israeli authorities had already released evidence of Shabat’s active Hamas affiliation, stating he had actively participated in hostilities, and was cynically changing into PRESS gear when it suited him.
It is difficult to understand why the CfMM believes the BBC should knowingly treat an armed Hamas terrorist as a neutral journalist. If this is the kind of example the CfMM offers as proof of institutional pro-Israel bias, it underscores just how thin the actual evidence is.
Bullying Towards an Antizionist Narrative
Throughout the report, the CfMM repeatedly criticises the BBC for not giving sufficient space to allegations that Israel is committing genocide. On page 73, they write:
“We have identified over 100 interviews where the interviewer proactively shuts down any assertions of a genocide taking place.” It goes on: “Overall, there is overwhelming evidence that reveals the BBC’s reluctance to air views that Israel is committing genocide.”
It is unclear why the CfMM expects the BBC to platform a claim that is firmly rejected by the UK government and the vast majority of Western states. One would assume that a report ostensibly focused on media accuracy would distinguish between political rhetoric and substantiated fact. Yet the term ‘genocide’ appears over 200 times in the CfMM’s own document!
Elsewhere in the report, similar complaints are levelled against the BBC for not using the ‘apartheid’ label, or for not referring to secretive Israeli military doctrines such as the Hannibal Directive (which Israel formally revoked in 2016.)
Taken together, these complaints suggest the CfMM is less concerned with journalistic standards than with advancing an antizionist framing. The expectation that the BBC should echo the language and positions common in anti-Israel activist circles reveals more about the CfMM’s bias than the BBC’s.
In essence, this highlights a core strategy behind the report: to construct a counter-narrative that distracts from the real issue — a BBC bias against Israel. The accuracy of the data is irrelevant, subjective judgments can all be skewed in one direction, and the conclusions easily manipulated. None of it matters. As long as the CfMM’s distorted findings give the antizionist camp the confidence to loudly claim that the BBC is biased in favour of Israel, the truth is drowned out by the sheer volume of those who shout the loudest.
And in a numbers game like that, the Jews will always lose.
Bad-Faith Actors
These findings align with other research into the CfMM’s ideological framing. A recent and extensive report by the respected Westminster think tank Policy Exchange described the CfMM as a ‘bad-faith‘ actor, whose purpose was to ‘take control of the narrative’ about Islam. Policy Exchange argued that the Centre’s critique was ‘part of a campaign to give legal and official force’ to the concept of Islamophobia. It accused the CfMM of attempting to suppress legitimate reporting, and described the organisation as ‘a threat to free speech.’
Yet the amateurish and error-ridden nature of the CfMM’s BBC report also raises serious questions about those who chose to promote it. Outlets such as Novara Media, Middle East Eye, the National (Scotland), and the Canary, offered glowing praise. Former BBC journalist Karishma Patel, who routinely attacks the BBC from the outside, described the CfMM’s deeply flawed report as ‘damning.’ Scottish historian William Dalrymple, told his 1.2 million followers on X that it was ‘an important analysis’. Owen Jones, also with a million followers on the platform, sat on a CfMM panel and fully endorsed its message.
Since even a cursory glance exposes the CfMM report as inaccurate propaganda which manipulates data to skew reader sentiment, it is an embarrassing misstep for all those who endorsed it so eagerly.
This blind support shows a deep problem in our society being spread from the heart of the anti-Israel movement. Truth and accuracy have become irrelevant, giving way to the constant drumbeat of narrative warfare. The BBC is not being attacked because it is inaccurate – but because it refuses to adopt the tone and priorities of a pro-Palestinian activist. In this worldview, anything short of open hostility towards Israel is framed as betrayal.
The CfMM functions openly as a political enforcer for the Muslim Council of Britain. It raises a troubling question: why Richard Burgess, the BBC’s Director of News Content, chose to appear on a panel at the CfMM launch. Why would the BBC lend credibility to a toxic organisation engaged in such ideologically driven and misleading media attacks?
Conclusion
If the goal is genuine media accountability, we need watchdogs committed to truth – not sinister political actors dressing up propaganda as analysis.
The CfMM’s true critique is not that the BBC is inaccurate, but that it refuses to adopt the CfMM’s political narrative. The report frames the BBC’s neutrality as complicity, accusing it of failing to call Israel’s actions genocide, failing to mention apartheid, and failing to constantly contextualise all events with occupation. This is not a demand for fairness – it is a demand for alignment.
The CfMM BBC report is not a neutral audit of media coverage. It is a political document dressed in the language of data. Its conclusions rely on a series of distortions: equating context with focus, using per-death metrics that distort proportionality, redefining impartiality as bias, and promoting emotionally charged language as journalistic duty. True media accountability requires more than statistical sleight of hand. It requires intellectual integrity and methodological transparency, neither of which are present in the CfMM report.
This report can be download as a PDF.
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