On August 20th the BBC News website published a report headlined “PepsiCo buys Sodastream for $3.2bn” on its Business and Middle East pages.
“PepsiCo has announced it is buying Sodastream for $3.2bn (£2.5bn).
Israel-based Sodastream makes a machine and refillable cylinders allowing users to make their own carbonated drinks. […]
PepsiCo will buy all outstanding shares of Sodastream for $144 each – almost 11% higher than its closing price in New York on Friday.
The stock has soared 85% this year after rising by 78% in 2017.
The takeover has already been approved by the boards of both firms. […]
If regulators approve the deal, it is expected to be finalised by January 2019, subject to a vote by Sodastream shareholders.”
Readers were not informed that SodaStream’s operations in Israel will continue as usual for at least 15 years. Neither were they informed that PepsiCo only entered the Israeli market in 1992, having previously conformed to the Arab League boycott.
Interestingly, the BBC’s report also refrained from mentioning that just four years ago, SodaStream was targeted by anti-Israel Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions campaigners including a political NGO – a campaign which was vigorously amplified on the BBC News website and on other platforms in early 2014.
BBC News recycles second-hand SodaStream slur, fails to explain BDS
BBC displays its campaigning colours in SodaStream story coverage
As was noted here at the time:
“As its coverage of this story shows, the BBC has abandoned its role as a provider of news and information regarding the anti-Israel BDS movement and emphatically tied its colours to the campaigning mast.”
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