BBC to review use of 'Islamic State' after MPs protest against term

David Cameron told the House of Commons that the use of the term Isil was better than that of Islamic State. Photograph: Video grab/AFP/Getty Images

By Jane Martinson
Monday, June 29, 2015

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The BBC is reviewing its use of the term “Islamic State” after a cross-party group of MPs, backed by David Cameron, accused the broadcaster of legitimising the terrorist group by continuing to use the name in its journalism.

A BBC spokesman said the corporation would consider the letter, signed by 120 MPs and sent to the BBC director general, Tony Hall, last week, but that it had had little choice other than to call the group “by the name it uses itself”.

“No one listening to our reporting could be in any doubt what kind of organisation this is,” a BBC statement said. “We call the group by the name it uses itself, and regularly review our approach. We also use additional descriptions to help make it clear we are referring to the group as they refer to themselves, such as ‘so-called Islamic State’.”

Earlier on Monday, Cameron clashed with BBC Radio 4 presenter John Humphrys over the issue. “I wish the BBC would stop calling it Islamic State because it’s not an Islamic state,” the prime minister said. “What it is, is an appalling, barbarous regime … It’s a perversion of the religion of Islam and many Muslims listening to this programme will recoil every time they hear the words Islamic State.”

The letter, initiated by Rehman Chishti, the Conservative MP for Gillingham and Rainham, was signed by the Tory London mayor, Boris Johnson, and the Labour chair of the home affairs select committee, Keith Vaz. It urges the BBC and other broadcasters to adopt the name “Daesh” for the group.

The term is based on an Arabic acronym al-Dawla al-Islamiya fil Iraq wa’al Sham, which translates as Islamic State of Iraq and Sham (Syria), but is close to “Dahes” or “one who sows discord”.

Later on Monday, Cameron appeared to muddy the waters on his position during a Commons debate about the UK’s response to the Tunisia massacre, in which 30 Britons are feared to have died.

“I personally think that using the term Isil or ‘so-called’ would be better than what [the BBC] currently do,” Cameron said. “I don’t think we’ll move them all the way to Daesh, so I think saying Isil is probably better than Islamic State because it is neither, in my view, Islamic or a state.”

Isil is short for Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant – a historical geographical term for the land stretching from southern Turkey through Syria to Egypt. The official website for the British security agency MI5 uses the name Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant to describe the organisation.

The Scottish National party’s Alex Salmond, one of the letter’s signatories, called for the government to adopt Daesh as an alternative title for the group. The French and Turkish governments use this term.

Other groups have joined in the protest against the use of the name. In a letter to the prime minister, the Islamic Society of Britain and the Association of Muslim Lawyers said: “It is neither Islamic, nor is it a state. The group has no standing with faithful Muslims, nor among the international community of nations.”

It said the negative connotation contrasted with any derivative of Islamic State which “gives legitimacy to a terrorist organisation that is not Islamic, nor has it been recognised as a state and which a vast number of Muslims around the world regard as despicable and insulting to their peaceful religion”.

In his column for the Dundee Courier, Salmond wrote: “We should start by understanding that in a propaganda war language is crucial.

“Any description of terrorists which confers on them the image that they are representing either a religion or a state must surely be wrong and an own goal of massive proportions. It is after all how they wish to refer to themselves.
“However, the real point of using Daesh is that it separates the terrorists from the religion they claim to represent and from the false dream of a new caliphate that they claim to pursue.”

The Guardian, in common with several other media groups, uses Islamic State at first mention, thereafter Isis.

The terror group, which started as a part of al-Qaida, first called itself Islamic State in June 2014 after formally declaring the establishment of a “caliphate”.

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