After Hosni Mubarak’s fall in Egypt, there was a whorl of ambiguous media commentary that either tried to present the Muslim Brotherhood as a conciliatory Islamist movement posing no threat to Egypt, its neighbours (read: Israel) or the West, or tried to challenge the Brotherhood about its core tenets and ultimate goals. Nowhere has this confused and contradictory approach been better exhibited than at the British Broadcasting Corporation.

An opening salvo in the image war was fired early on in the Egyptian revolution. On January 31, BBC Middle East editor Jeremy Bowen wrote in an online news article: “Unlike the jihadis, [the Brotherhood] does not believe it is at war with the West. It is conservative, moderate and non-violent. But it is highly critical of Western policy in the Middle East.” Bowen only affirmed what by then had become his news division’s flattering line. On January 28, the BBC posted to its website an info-box summary of the Brotherhood’s orientation, which it unquestioningly described as “reject[ing] the use of violence and support[ing] democratic principles.”