Then Israel started giving tours to villages in southern Lebanon to the media, showing not only that Israel had captured territory, but it was confident enough that Hezbollah would not fire on them because the areas around those villages were cleared.
This was totally unacceptable to the terror group that wants to control the narrative. And it went mostly after the BBC, which it sees as the weakest link and easiest to manipulate.
Hezbollah strongly condemned what it describes as dangerous behavior by several Western media outlets, following a promotional tour organized by the Israeli army for journalists.In a statement released on Monday, the group had initially reacted to a BBC report by Jerusalem correspondent Lucy Williamson, who crossed into southern Lebanon as part of the convoy arranged for journalists by the Israeli military."Following our previous statement regarding the promotional tour organized by the Zionist occupation army for several Western media outlets, it has become clear that, in addition to the BBC, networks and institutions such as The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, The Telegraph, Fox News, Reuters, The New York Times, The Financial Times, the Associated Press and other networks and channels also participated in this tour," Hezbollah said.“The BBC, with all its platforms and in different languages, did not just blindly side with the murderers and criminals and justify the Zionist barbarism against the Palestinian and Lebanese peoples, but brazenly sent a team that entered a southern village accompanied by the occupation army and violated the sanctity of Lebanese territory, sovereignty, and applicable Lebanese laws, as shown by the reports published by this institution,” Hezbollah said in a statement Monday.Hezbollah’s Media Relations condemned “this unjustified and absolutely unacceptable move and demands the Ministry of Information, the National Media Council, and the relevant judicial and security agencies take the necessary legal measures against the BBC and its teams in Lebanon and protest to the BBC Company and the legal bodies representing it. It also demands that the unions of journalists, editors, and free media outlets in the world condemn this step,” Hezbollah concluded.Six employees of BBC Arabic in Beirut announced their resignation today, Monday, in protest against a report published by BBC English about the fighting in southern Lebanon after the team visited Lebanese areas accompanied by the Israeli army.The seven employees are Sana Khoury, Mohamed Hamdar, Marie-Josée Qazzi and Joey Sleem, along with three others from the BBC Extra team. They stated that "they will not return to work unless the institution issues an apology for the report or holds accountable the team that accompanied the Israeli army."
Wow. Who knew that journalists embedded with an army were breaking the law? All those reports from Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere where every major media outlet participated were illegal, according to Hezbollah!
This is Hezbollah panicking about losing a battle in the information war. The usual response is an over the top, crazed reaction, knowing that Western reporters do not want to be harassed by anti-Israel drones on social media and perhaps in real life.
