Danny Cohen attacks the BBC corporation: broadcasting propaganda of the Iranian regime and Hamas

According to Cohen, the BBC did not learn from its past mistakes in covering the war in Gaza, and now the ayatollahs in Tehran are “playing” the network in the same way that Hamas did. Cohen’s central criticism focuses on an article broadcast in prime time by senior international reporter Lise Dost.

In the article, which was described as a tour of the Iranian capital, Dost presented a festive and relaxed atmosphere. Cohen shockingly quotes the line that opened the report: “This is a public holiday and in Tehran it feels like a family festival.”

For Cohen, this description is not just journalistic “color”, but a dangerous distortion of reality. He mentions that in the Iran of the year 2026, where opposition to the regime is met with bullets and hanging, defining the situation as a “family festival” is “an erasure of reality bordering on propaganda.” He emphasizes that the report completely ignored the mass massacre of protesters that happened only a few weeks before, and the thousands of arrests of civilians whose fate is unknown.

Cohen raises serious questions about the network’s journalistic standards: “How can it meet even the most basic journalistic standards expected of the BBC?”. He criticizes the fact that not a single critical voice is heard in the article – not from regime opponents, not from bereaved families and not from students whose friends have disappeared. “We got the kind of interviews you get when the regime feels comfortable with the answers,” he states.

The column links the conduct in Iran with the BBC’s coverage of the war in Gaza. Cohen claims that in both cases there is an “identical weakness”: a reluctance to confront the guilty parties head-on and hold them accountable. According to him, as the network treats Hamas as a “normal” government and a reliable source of information, so it is now doing with the regime in Tehran.

In conclusion, Cohen calls on the BBC to provide explanations. He points out that the term “Ayatollah BBC”, used by opponents of the Iranian regime, does not stem from a conspiracy theory, but rather from the dismal result on the ground: the world-renowned broadcaster produces content that a theocratic and tyrannical regime can happily file under the category “life goes on as usual”.