With the CBC, progress is sometimes two steps forward and two steps back.

Recently, we exposed CBC journalist Chris Brown for sanitizing and whitewashing Palestinian terrorism, and for sympathetically portraying Palestinian terrorists as victims.

As we’ve noted, there’s a recurring pattern that when CBC reports on Palestinian death tolls, more often than not, our public broadcaster’s journalists fail to disclose that most, if not all of the Palestinian casualties, are terrorists; many of whom were killed in armed conflict with Israeli forces, or who were neutralized while carrying out a terror attack.

We’ve also observed that with respect to casualty tolls on the Israeli side, CBC’s journalist has errantly reported on the number of Israelis killed this year by Palestinian terrorists.

HonestReporting Canada has been in regular communication with the CBC to sensitize our public broadcaster to these concerns and more, but issues with Chris Brown’s reporting continue to persist. On March 12, CBC Radio broadcast reports throughout the day by Chris Brown who reported the following:

“At the same time, there’s been a significant increase in deadly violent confrontations between Palestinians and Israeli settlers and Israeli security forces, which Palestinians blame on Israel’s new government and it’s ultra-conservative agenda. Three more Palestinians were shot dead last night near Nablus after Israel’s military claimed one of its outposts was attacked. Chris Brown, CBC news Tel-Aviv.”

In sharp contrast, Mr. Brown’s CBC News.ca article, also on March 12, acknowledged that the three dead were “Palestinian gunmen” from the Lion’s Den terror group. Mr. Brown said:

“So far in 2023, more than 80 Palestinians, including militants and civilians, have been killed in Israeli military raids. the same time, 14 Israelis have been killed in attacks by Palestinian militants. In one of the latest incidents on Sunday, Israeli troops killed three Palestinian gunmen who attacked their post in the occupied West Bank, the army said; a fourth gunman was detained after surrendering. The Lions’ Den, a militant group based in Nablus, issued a statement claiming the three gunmen as members.”

While we were pleased to see improvement in Mr. Brown’s CBC News.ca report which acknowledged that these 3 dead Palestinians were armed gunmen and which stated that 14 Israelis have been killed in Palestinian terror attacks this year, not 11 as he previously reported, it’s unfortunate that Mr. Brown’s CBC Radio report failed to clearly state that the 3 dead Palestinians were these gunmen. CBC listeners could have come to the wrong conclusion that 3 innocent Palestinian civilians may have been killed. As it stands, CBC Radio’s report merely claimed that an Israeli outpost was attacked and that after the attack, three Palestinians were shot dead near Nablus. That doesn’t necessarily mean that the dead Palestinians were the gunmen assailants, it could be interpreted that 3 presumably innocent Palestinian civilians were killed due to Mr. Brown’s failure to specify that these casualties were combatants.

In contradistinction, a CBC television report by Chris Brown on March 12 saw the CBC’s journalist acknowledge that the 3 dead Palestinians “fired automatic weapons” according to the Israel Defense Forces. Brown Reported that: “Violence involving Israeli settlers and security forces has spiked, with three more young Palestinian men killed near Nablus overnight by Israeli soldiers after they fired automatic weapons at an outpost according to Israel’s military.”

That said, in this CBC television report, again reporter Chris Brown failed to mention that Palestinians are also certainly involved in the recent “spike” of violence, which contrary to his claims, was not exclusive to “Israeli settlers and security forces.”

Accordingly, and in our view, these CBC Radio and TV reports were misleading and confusing to CBC’s listening and viewing audiences, while the CBC’s online report was fair and accurate and which did acknowledge the makeup of Palestinian casualties as being armed combatants.

HonestReporting Canada will continue to vigilantly monitor the CBC’s reporting and hold our public broadcaster to account.