OP-ED: CBC news coverage of the Middle East is systemically biased

Hymie Rubenstein writes, "CBC News coverage of the Middle East is systemically pro-Palestinian with omissions, 'emotional language,' and selective facts that skew the audience’s perception of Israel."

Author: Hymie Rubenstein

Image: TNC

CBC News coverage of the Middle East is systemically pro-Palestinian with omissions, “emotional language,” and selective facts that skew the audience’s perception of Israel, a B’nai Brith Canada report has just proclaimed. The network has denied its coverage is biased.

B’nai Brith – Hebrew for “children of the Covenant” – is Canada’s oldest independent Jewish human rights organization committed to the security and continuity of the Jewish people and the State of Israel, along with efforts to combat antisemitism and other forms of bigotry.

Its January 9 report states that, “[CBC] Bias is neither occasional nor confined to a single mechanism.” The finding followed an audit of hundreds of CBC News stories on the Hamas war between October 1, 2024 and April 30, 2025.

In a comprehensive 17-page white paper released on January 5, B’nai Brith Canada showed that the results highlighted “a consistent directional pattern across CBC’s coverage.”

“More than half of all sampled items met the study’s threshold for a pro-Palestinian orientation, while fewer than seven per cent met the same threshold in a pro-Israel direction. Balanced or neutral items accounted for just under forty per cent of the sample,” the white paper’s data revealed.

The study is a follow-up to a previous B’nai Brith Canada study, using similar methods, that addressed coverage from October 7, 2023, to December 31, 2023.

B’nai Brith Canada researchers fed these news items into a Large Language Model (LLM), which they trained to deliver bias scores according to industry-leading benchmarks established in academic disciplines such as communications studies and political science. LLM-assisted conclusions were then manually verified by B’nai Brith Canada’s research team.

As CBC is a public corporation, its reporting is subject to Canada’s Broadcasting Act, which mandates that it strive to be as balanced and impartial as possible.

“The point of this investigation is not to undermine the CBC’s factual credibility or suggest it is wilfully distorting its coverage,” said Richard Robertson, Director of Research and Advocacy for B’nai Brith Canada. “We are releasing this research because Canadians value the CBC and deserve balanced, fair coverage of geopolitical issues.”

“B’nai Brith Canada has brought similar concerns to the CBC in the past. At the time, the broadcaster refused to meet with our organization.”

“The CBC must be prepared to take constructive criticism if it wishes to regain the confidence and trust of all Canadians,” said Simon Wolle, Chief Executive Officer for B’nai Brith Canada. “Our study is important because the CBC’s journalism shapes public opinion. When its reporting is unbalanced, it can be taken out of context or manipulated to serve certain political ends.”

B’nai Brith Canada is calling on the CBC to agree to a meeting to discuss these findings and develop a strategy to ensure its reporting aligns with its mandate and serves Canada’s public interest.

“Our efforts to hold the CBC accountable do not end here,” Wolle said. “We would like to cooperate with the CBC, moving forward, to produce balanced, unbiased reporting.”

Fewer than 40 percent of Mideast stories were considered “balanced or neutral,” said the report Structural Patterns In CBC Coverage Of The Israel-Hamas Conflict. Of stories that strayed from plain depictions of fact a majority, 55 percent, were pro-Palestinian, it said.

“Heavy reliance on international humanitarian organizations, foregrounding of humanitarian impact without equivalent causal context, asymmetrical emotional language and selective omission of initiating actions are all practices that fall within standard journalistic norms,” wrote B’nai Brith. “Individually any one of these choices may appear reasonable or even necessary. Taken together and repeated across hundreds of items, they produce a systemic narrative effect.”

“The analysis does not argue the CBC should suppress humanitarian coverage, rely exclusively on official Israeli sources or adopt a particular political stance,” said CBC Coverage. “It demonstrates instead that current editorial routines systematically privilege certain narratives and frames while marginalizing others, even in the absence of intent.”

Though the report did not detail specific examples, the network’s own ombudsman has cited instances of skewed coverage.

According to Blacklock’s Reporter, Marie-Philippe Bouchard, CEO of the CBC, in testimony last October 20 at the Commons heritage committee, claimed news reports were unbiased at all times. “All our shows, especially in the news area, are governed by the same journalistic standards and practices,” she said.

“There would be no bias at the CBC?” asked Conservative MP Rachael Thomas (Lethbridge, Alta.).

“I am not oblivious to the fact some people claim there is bias but that’s not how we work,” replied Bouchard.

“What is your perception?” asked MP Thomas. “My perception is we are working very hard to try to bring accurate, fact-based news and information to Canadians every day,” replied Bouchard.

“There’s no bias, according to you?” asked MP Thomas. “There’s no bias, according to me,” replied Bouchard.

Access To Information records showed from the first October 7, 2023 killings and kidnappings of Jews in Israel the network’s Director of Journalism Standards ordered staff not to call Hamas “terrorists.” The network’s own ombudsman faulted a story that described the killings as a “surprise attack by Hamas militants” resulting in casualties to both sides as “Israeli airstrikes pounded the Gaza Strip.”

“The language throughout is antiseptic as though this had been a normal clash between two rival military forces,” wrote then-Ombudsman Jack Nagler.

CBC News published an erroneous October 17, 2023 story falsely claiming Israeli rockets destroyed the Al-Ahli Hospital in Gaza, and last September 16 suspended announcer Elisa Serret, for telling viewers that Jews controlled the United States. “Big cities are run by Jews,” she said. “Hollywood is run by Jews.”

Hymie Rubenstein, editor of REAL Indigenous Report and REAL Israel & Palestine Report, is a retired professor of anthropology at the University of Manitoba and a senior fellow at the Frontier Centre for Public Policy.