The BBC’s Coverage of October 7 Was on a Par With Its Genocide Denial Throughout the Holocaust in Gaza

No Mention of the Hannibal Doctrine, No Mention of Israel’s 17 Year Siege of Gaza, No Mention of Israel’s Policy of ‘Mowing the Lawn’ – For the BBC History Began on October 7

Tzipi Hotoveli Interview With Piers Morgan

Dear Tim Davie,

You should be congratulated on your coverage of the second anniversary of October 7. Once again, you have faithfully acted as the Foreign Office’s Obedient Servant. I compliment you on your skill in manipulating language in an attempt to erase from memory the Genocide in Gaza.

‘Genocide’ is a word that the BBC decided to ban despite every human rights organisation, from Amnesty to B’tselem  and the UN’s own Commission concluding that genocide was taking place.

Not only did the BBC not use the word Genocide but it interrupted guests at least 100 times when they dared to mention the word. As the Media Monitoring Report on your Double Standards asked

Why has the BBC downplayed genocide allegations over 100 times while omitting Israeli genocidal statements such as Netanyahu’s Amalek reference cited by the ICJ?’ 

It’is a good question but I suspect that you don’t have an answer which isn’t economical with the truth. Either way it shows whose side you were on.

In July 2024 an article in The Lancet estimated that the true figure of Palestinians killed, after 9 months, was 186,000 direct and indirect deaths. After 24 months that figure would be 496,000. However given the starvation blockade by Israel since March 2025 the numbers may be considerably higher.

Dr Gideon Polya estimated in January 2025 that the true figure of direct and indirect deaths may have been 553,000.

This tallies with the number that Israel’s Ambassador to London, Tzipi Hotoveli estimated might need to be killed, 600,000, when she was interviewed by Piers Morgan in October 2023.

So what does the BBC do after two years of Israel’s genocidal attack on Gaza?   It focuses its attention on the Israeli ‘victims’ of October 7.

It is as if a history of the Warsaw Ghetto were to focus on a sympathetic portrait of the Nazis who died in the Uprising rather than the Jews who died in the fighting.

It is clear where the BBC’s sympathies lie.  With the modern day Nazis who killed the human animals occupying Gaza Ghetto and who sought to ethnically cleanse Gaza.

Throughout the Gaza holocaust the BBC has deliberately ignored the genocidal statements of intent by Israeli ministers such as Amichai Eliyahu who first called for a nuclear bomb to be dropped on Gaza and in May 2025 called for food reserves in Gaza to be bombed. "They need to starve," he said.

Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich on 6 May 2025 told settler representatives that

Within a few months, we will be able to declare that we have won. Gaza will be totally destroyed

But if the BBC minimised Palestinian suffering it magnified that of Israel. In your coverage you repeatedly said ‘about 1200 Israelis were killed’. In fact 1,139 died according to Bituah Leumi, Israel's social security agency.

Israeli forces shot their own civilians, kibbutz survivor says (Full with subtitles)

Of the Israelis who died just one baby, Mila Cohen, died and that was accidental. Compare that to the thousands of Palestinians babies murdered. Approximately 400 soldiers and police were killed. Not once has the BBC mentioned that one-third of those killed on October 7 were legitimate military targets.

About 750 civilians died. However it is clear that the majority of them were killed by Israel itself which put the Hannibal Directive into operation as early as 7.18 a.m. when an order was issued to despatch a Zik, an attack drone, against soldiers at Erez Junction.

The Hannibal Directive says that if a soldier is in danger of being captured he should be killed. It was employed throughout October 7. Is there a reason that the BBC has never, not once, mentioned the term Hannibal Directive even though Israeli papers have frequently discussed it?  This is news management worthy of Pravda.

The only survivor of a house in Kibbutz Be’eri that was shelled by an Israeli tank, Yasmine Porat, told Israel’s Kan Radio that 13 Israeli hostages were killed by Israeli security forces. She also said that she and other civilians were treated humanely by the Palestinian fighters.

Israeli State Radio 15.10.23. (jpg)

Tank fires on Israeli civilian home in Kibbutz Be'eri, 7 October 2023

In Samantha Simmons broadcast on October 7 she mentioned the attack on Kibbutz Be’eri, where 101 Israelis died.  What was not mentioned was the fact, (Ha'aretz 7.7.24) that Brig. Gen. Barak Hiram gave orders for a tank to fire on a house holding 14 hostages including Yasmine Porat.  The same happened throughout Kibbutz Be’eri but the BBC thought that such matters might confuse people and its message that the October 7 attack was unprovoked. 

Ha'aretz’s Nir Hasson quoted a resident of Be’eri, Tuval, who spoke about the ‘difficult decisions’ of Israeli commanders which:

 Include(d) shelling houses with all their occupants inside in order to eliminate the terrorists along with the hostages... The price was terrible: at least 112 Be’eri people were killed.”

Why has none of this been mentioned by the BBC?

The implication is clear. The Israelis who died at Be’eri, one-seventh of all Israeli civilians killed, were killed by Israeli tanks.

Video released by Israeli army shows helicopters firing indiscriminately on 7 October

Sourced from YNet

This is how so many cars at the music festival ended up destroyed. Apache helicopters!
FYI : The IDF collected all the destroyed cars and arranged them one month after the incident pic.twitter.com/sHVL4YIMIT

— Syrian Girl (@Partisangirl) November 9, 2023

The lie that October 7 was the beginning of history is best illustrated by the Israeli phrase that it was moving the lawn (or grass) in Gaza. As John Feffor of the Institute of Policy Studies explained:

Ever since it withdrew its settlements in 2005, Israel has periodically attacked Gaza. This shelling of locations throughout the narrow strip of land gave rise to the Israeli expression “mowing the lawn.” In other words, Israel was bombing Gaza on a regular basis to “maintain order.”

Razan al-Najar 

In other words Israel has periodically attacked Gaza with overwhelming force every few years in order to ensure that Gazans understood who was in charge.  Attacks by Israel occurred in 2008/9 (Operation Cast Lead), 2012 (Pillar of Defence), 2014 (Protective Edge), the Great Return March (March 2018) and May 2021. Thousands of Palestinians were killed and injured in these attacks so the BBC pretence that nothing had occurred before October 2023 is an egregious lie.

The Great Return March of 2018 was completely peaceful but Israeli snipers fired from earth banks thousands of rounds which killed about 300 people and injured thousands (they had been told to fire at knee caps in order to deliberately disable as many as possible). This was symbolised by the deliberate murder of the unarmed Razan al-Najar, a 20 year old medic.

Likewise there was no mention of the Apache helicopters which Israel used throughout the day to fire on any vehicle returning to Gaza or thought likely to do so. There is abundant evidence that their pilots shot at everything that moved and killed the occupants of the cars, Israelis included.

Drone footage from the scene of the music festival shows the damaged cars before they were rearranged by the IDF. pic.twitter.com/qs6F9SZh3S

— Syrian Girl (@Partisangirl) November 9, 2023

 The Israeli military released drone footage showing hundreds of scorched and damaged cars moved from the Nova music festival, providing further evidence that Israeli forces likely killed many of their own on 7 October, as RT reported on 6 November.  Hamas fighers were carrying light weapons which could not possibly have caused such damage.

Perhaps you can explain why the Australian Broadcasting Service can run a story ‘Israeli forces accused of killing their own citizens under the 'Hannibal Directive' during October 7 chaos’ but the BBC is incapable of doing so? Don’t worry I know the answer Tim which is that you were put into the BBC in order to ensure that you continued to function as the Voice of Israel.

I hesitate to ask why the figures of dead and injured from Gaza’s Health Ministry are always accompanied by a reference to Hamas-run, whereas the BBC never refers to Israeli propaganda as Likud-run. After all it is Israel which has consistently lied throughout the genocide, to the extent of barring reporters from entering Gaza and doing its best to kill those who are already there.

Israel murdered 15 Medics on 23 March whilst claiming that they had approached Israeli troops in unlit vehicles. When this was proved to be a lie, as video footage had been collected from one of the dead bodies, Israel claimed that it was all a ‘mistake’, an explanation that the BBC carried faithfully.

Under your genocide cleansing leadership the BBC pulled from ‘i’ player Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone, a film starring a 13 year old Palestinian narrator Abdullah because his father was deputy Agriculture Minister in Gaza’s government, as if the sins of the father are those of the children.  No evidence has ever been produced that the father was a member of Hamas, not that that should have made any difference. At least he wasn’t a member of Religious Zionism.

And if one act of cowardice was not enough, you pulled Gaza: Doctors Under Attack because of concerns over impartiality.  Presumably it is BBC policy not to differentiate between Good and Evil. I can only assume that future BBC programmes on the Holocaust will include neo-Nazis and holocaust deniers being allowed equal time for the sake of ‘balance’.

Gaza’s genocide is a holocaust and the BBC has been an accomplice to that genocide.

Tony Greenstein