BBC lauds antisemitic imam as ‘highly respected’

Sheikh Haitham Al Haddad praised Hamas’ October 7 massacre and sees “Zionist” conspirators behind recent anti-immigrant riots in Great Britain.

By Batya Jerenberg, World Israel News

The BBC on Friday called a radical, antisemitic imam “highly respected” in introducing him on a talk show, drawing scathing criticism from at least one Conservative MP.

Sheikh Haitham Al Haddad is a leading member of many Islamic organizations in the UK, including the Sharia Council.

He has a long history of antisemitic and anti-Israel statements, and made clear his support for the genocidal Hamas organization on October 7, when it led some 3,000 terrorists in invading Israel, massacring 1,200 people, and taking 251 hostage, 115 of whom still remain in captivity.

“O Allah, support the people of truth in Gaza, Al-Quds and Palestine – they have managed to cause confusion to the enemy’s calculations with a new tactic,” he posted to Facebook that day. “Grant them victory and aid them against their oppressors in their struggle for Justice and Truth.”

The imam, who is of Palestinian Arab origin, has also not made a secret of his revulsion of Jews, calling them “the descendants of monkeys and pigs.”

The BBC Radio show presented him as a conciliatory figure amidst right-wing riots that have wracked several cities in the country following the misidentification two weeks ago of a killer of three children at a party as an immigrant Muslim.

However, soon after the violence began, al Haddad accused the rioters of having a nefarious “Zionist” purpose in a sermon at the Greenwich Islamic Center in South London.

“Some of them have an agenda and some of them have – maybe that agenda is connected to Zionism at large,” he maintained. “Yes, we know this. And we know that some of them may want to divert the attention of the Government from condemning what the Zionist-state Israel is doing and they want to stop arming Israel, so they want to attract the attention or divert the attention of the Government.”

Conservative MP Nick Timothy was outraged at the airtime al Haddad was given, pointing out in a post on X that the imam has been condemned by the British government’s own Commission for Countering Extremism.

“Haitham al-Haddad’s views are misogynistic, racist and homophobic,” he quoted from a 2018 blog by the group’s top commissioner, Sara Khan. “They promote a supremacist ‘us versus them’ worldview that wrongly makes Muslims feel that they can’t be fully British; that permits bullying and intimidation of those who choose not to conform, and that has the damaging effect of tarring many Muslims by association.”

The parliamentarian then asked, “Why is the BBC introducing Haitham al-Haddad as ‘the highly respected imam’? Why is it giving him a platform at all?”

In response to the criticism, a BBC spokesperson said, “We invited Haitham al-Haddad onto the program to talk about conciliation following disorder in parts of the country. We accept we should have been clearer about the views he has expressed in the past and challenged him on them more robustly.”

The BBC has been harshly condemned by many British Jews and members of the former Conservative government for its long-held anti-Israel bias, and especially as it covers the Israel-Hamas war in a way its critics say downplays the thousands of rocket and other terror attacks Israelis suffer every day, and accepts Hamas propaganda as truth.

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