But a Mail on Sunday investigation has uncovered some disturbing truths about six of the eight medics interviewed – evidence that should, at the very least, have given BBC news executives pause for thought as they rolled out their scoop with dramatic fanfare.
Astonishingly, all six have repeatedly spouted anti-Semitic slurs on social media, with posts ranging from the provocative and inflammatory to the downright obscene.
Last night, our findings prompted demands for an independent inquiry into the BBC report. A peer said the corporation was being ‘led by its nose by Hamas’.
In one post, Dr Amira Al-Assouli (misspelled on the BBC caption), whose account of being targeted by Israeli gunfire was at the forefront of the BBC’s coverage, plainly supports a Hamas rocket attack on Israel.
‘O Lord, turn every Palestinian missile into a Zionist casualty, and turn every casualty into a thousand families that leave our homeland,’ she wrote.
In another she said: ‘Lord protect our mujahideen [jihadi fighters] and support them with your angels and kill the Jews.’
On the day of the October 7 attacks, the doctor posted a photo of a dead man, Fayez Saeed Al-Assouli, later accused on social media of taking part in the incursion. Dr Al-Assouli, a volunteer at Nasser hospital, describes him as ‘the first martyr of our family’.
Another doctor, Hatem Raba, wrote on Facebook: ‘May Allah guide the missiles of Palestine’s mujahideen.’
Elsewhere he praised a terrorist who blew up a bus killing 38 Israeli civilians – 13 of them children – in 1978 as a ‘legend’ and a ‘martyr’.
The hospital’s general manager Atef Al-Hout (also misspelled on the BBC caption) – who told the BBC that Israel Defence Forces (IDF) soldiers detained medics and forced them to kneel with their hands behind their heads for hours – shared his colleagues’ admiration of Hamas.
‘Jerusalem and Gaza are in the camp of resistance. May Allah guide your missiles,’ he wrote in 2021 after a Hamas rocket blitz on Israel.
Last night, Jewish Tory MP Andrew Percy told The Mail on Sunday: ‘The BBC seemingly doesn’t seem to care that it keeps casually giving airtime to people who openly support the murder and assault of innocent civilians through terrorism.’
Daily Mail
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