BRITISH media are suppressing mentions of Israel’s genocide in Gaza, an analysis of reports by Declassified UK has found.
The media site looked at the Twitter feeds of ITV, BBC, Channel 4, Guardian and Sky and found “very little” coverage of allegations by UN officials and others that Israel is promoting genocide against Palestinians.
One indicator of what stories news organisations consider to be important is those they publicise on social media, Declassified UK said.
There are just two mentions of the word “genocide” in the BBC World Twitter feed since October 7, according to its analysis.
One was about Rwanda and the other reported on the negative comments made about US congresswoman Rashida Tlaib for talking about a genocide in Gaza.
On October 19 and November 2, UN special rapporteurs issued high-profile warnings that Palestinians in Gaza “are at grave risk of genocide.”
And on November 16, a larger group of UN experts issued a further statement, referring to evidence of “increasing genocidal intent” and speaking of a “genocide in the making.”
Many major media outlets, including CNN, Al Jazeera, Reuters and the Jerusalem Post, devoted whole stories to the statement.
But in Britain, the October 19 statement was barely covered, Declassified found, and the November 2 warning featured as a small part of a bigger Guardian story on Israeli Defence Force actions and a brief mention in its regular daily round-up. Some BBC bulletins also referred to it briefly.
This is in contrast to the British media’s willingness to report on genocide in Ukraine and other parts of the world, Declassified said.
A full breakdown can be found on the Declassified UK website.