BBC staff quit union after being told to wear colors of Palestinian flag, keffiyeh

Several BBC staff members quit the journalists' union after being told to wear the colors of the Palestinian flag, Jewish News reported on Wednesday.

The National Union of Journalists (NUJ) and the Trades Union Congress (TUC) reportedly sent messages asking workers to “wear something red, green, black or a Palestinian keffiyeh.”

This directive is part of a Day of Action for Palestine, an event calling for a permanent ceasefire in Gaza.

One BBC staff member told Jewish News that this “hypocritical and antisemitic” suggestion was a breach of the BBC’s commitment to impartial reporting, saying, “BBC journalists, who pride themselves on impartiality and who fought to keep their NUJ free of politics, are being encouraged to break the BBC’s editorial guidelines by supporting a political cause.” 

In a message to NUJ members, the union responded, “Clearly, members working across the BBC and in public service broadcasting have important duties in relation to impartiality and work within social media guidelines the NUJ would not wish members to breach.”

According to Jewish News, more members of NUJ are expected to resign following this situation.

Charlotte Henry, a freelance journalist who resigned, wrote that the union had become “a hostile environment for Jews, and I can no longer be part of that.”

The TUC declined to comment on whether it had previously requested workers to wear colors representing one side in a conflict. However, it admitted that it has never asked its members to wear Ukrainian colors during the ongoing conflict with Russia, Jewish News reported. 

The Board of Deputies of British Jews issued a statement directed at both unions.

“Whatever the stated intent, attempts to bring this issue into the workplace in such a fashion will undoubtedly add to the belligerent atmosphere which many Jewish staff have been facing.”

Anti-Israel bias

In September, a report from The Telegraph, based on research led by British lawyer Trevor Asserson, showed that the BBC had breached its editorial guidelines for news coverage more than 1,500 times since the beginning of the Israel-Hamas War.

The research found that there was a “deeply worrying pattern of bias against Israel” and that Israel was associated with genocide 14 times more than the Hamas terror group was throughout the analyzed BBC coverage.

Further findings from the research included the BBC’s repeated downplaying of Hamas terrorism. Conversely, Israel was presented as a “militaristic and aggressive nation” by the BBC, the report said.