DUBAI: British broadcaster the BBC has apologized after a documentary hosted by popular presenter Stacey Dooley referred to a Muslim gesture as a Daesh salute.
In the clip, which has already been removed from the final version of the episode of the current affairs series “Panorama” which aired on Monday, Dooley inaccurately described the gestures of the women raising their fingers in the air as a Daesh salute.
Dooley, 32, has risen to fame on British TV over the last decade, presenting social-issue themed television documentaries
The UK-based organization Tell MAMA (Measuring Anti-Muslim Attacks), which documents anti-Muslim attacks in the country, immediately called out the error on Twitter, explaining what the gesture meant.
“Tawhid (Tawheed) is the defining doctrine of Islam, demonstrating the oneness of Allah (God). To reduce such a fundamental and important concept to a mere “IS salute” is grossly wrong, ignorant, and damaging,” Tell MAMA wrote on Monday.
Tawhid (Tawheed) is the defining doctrine of Islam, demonstrating the oneness of Allah (God). To reduce such a fundamental and important concept to a mere "IS salute" is grossly wrong, ignorant, and damaging. @BBCPanorama, please address this in the upcoming #ISBrides doc. pic.twitter.com/JVW4hLJQIc
— TellMAMAUK (@TellMamaUK) August 5, 2019
BBC has carried out a further edit of the documentary, removing the scene and apologized for the mistake.
“We wrongly described a gesture made by women filmed in a Kurdish controlled detention camp in northern Syria as an IS salute,” a BBC spokesman said.
“We apologize for this error and have removed this description from the footage,” he added.
The Panorama show featured Dooley visiting Kurdish controlled camps in northern Syria, and speaking to women who left their own countries to join Daesh.
