BBC News and BBC Sport ignore FIFA’s Jibril Rajoub disciplinary

While the BBC chose to promote a specific narrative on the cancellation of a football friendly, it now appears to have lost interest in the story.

As was documented here earlier this month, the BBC News website’s framing of the reason for the cancellation of a football friendly between Israel and Argentina was glaringly apparent in the article’s headline – “Argentina cancels Israel World Cup friendly after Gaza violence” – and in its tagging – “Gaza border clashes” – as well as its opening lines.

“Argentina has cancelled a World Cup warm-up match with Israel, apparently under political pressure over Israel’s treatment of Palestinians in Gaza.”

Using the same tag the BBC News website also promoted a report by ‘BBC Minute’ that framed the story in the same way.

“Argentina has cancelled a World Cup friendly against Israel that was scheduled to take place in Jerusalem. It’s apparently under political pressure over Israel’s treatment of Palestinians in Gaza.”

Listeners to that edition of “the dynamic 60-second news bursts aimed at younger audiences around the world” were told by the BBC’s Middle East correspondent Yolande Knell that:

“…if the Argentinians played their game here in Jerusalem then they would be ignoring Israel’s occupation of the eastern part of the city and also those deadly protests that have been taking place along the Israel-Gaza border.”

Beyond that context-free presentation, in common with the BBC News website article the BBC Minute report failed to make any mention whatsoever of the threats received by the Argentinian team members – even though the BBC was obviously aware of that part of the story.

As numerous media outlets (for example here and here) reported a week after that story broke, FIFA has since announced the opening of related disciplinary proceedings against the head of the Palestinian football association.

“FIFA said Thursday it has started disciplinary proceedings against the Palestinian Football Association’s chief, after he called for protest against Lionel Messi and his plan to play with Argentina in Jerusalem.

“The FIFA disciplinary committee has opened disciplinary proceedings against the president of the Palestinian Football Association, Jibril Rajoub,” a spokesman for the world body said in a statement to AFP.

Its decision, he wrote, “came as a result of his statements, widely reported in the media, with respect to the international friendly match that was scheduled to take place on 9 June 2018 between Israel and Argentina.””

Interestingly, neither the BBC News website nor the BBC Sport website has to date seen fit to inform audiences of that development in a story it previously reported on multiple platforms.

Related Articles:

How BBC News framed the Argentina-Israel football match story

BBC WS reports what the BBC website didn’t on the Argentina football story

 

 

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