is at the top of the hour, which is straight after this programme. how to report on the conflict in gaza — welcome to newswatch with me, samira ahmed. coming up — without direct access to the war zone, how can bbc news provide an impartial and accurate picture of the conflict in the middle east? we ask the bbc�*s chief international correspondent, lyse doucet, how she personally deals with this challenge. sunday's six month anniversary of the attacks by hamas on israel was marked by reports and special programmes across the bbc, including a documentary that night on bbc two introduced by lyse doucet. october seventh shattered israel's security, its sense of self, and it sparked what is now the longest, most grievous gaza war. it lit fires right across this region and shocked the world

into caring about this age old conflict again. two films followed, eyewitness accounts — first from israeli film—makers of the massacre at the nova music festival — and then from a palestinian journalist of the work of the palestinian red crescent society in the months that followed. rachel mcbride had this response.... much of the bbc�*s coverage of the conflict has been harrowing, and it's also been controversial, with many complaints of bias, both anti—israeli and anti—palestinian. bbc news has also had to deal with a lack of direct access for most of the time to gaza, which prompted mike domingo

to ask us recently... well, onejournalist who's been reporting from jerusalem for much of the past six months and joins us from there now is lyse doucet, chief international correspondent for bbc news. thank you so much for coming on newswatch. you introduce the darkest days — what was the thinking behind it? well, i agree with the people who emailed. it was a hard watch. i found it incredibly hard to watch. i had to stop when i watched the israeli film about the nova festival. i also stopped when i was watching the palestinian film, and i think bbc knew that these would be very difficult for our audience to to comprehend, to watch till the end. and so it was decided that they needed someone to introduce the films, to put them into context,

to warn audiences that there would be very distressing images. it was decided that perhaps the six month mark of this grievous war was a moment to remind our audiences about the human cost — this really, really devastating human cost of this conflict on both sides, the israeli side, and on the side of palestinians. and so that's when i was brought in to be the person who presents, who warns, but also tries to put them into context. that warning that preceded the documentary saying there would be graphic violence, disturbing scenes in it, it's all the more striking, because bbc news coverage has generally tried to avoid showing the worst of the violence. i wonder how you personally feel about how much viewers should be shown. for those who watch the bbc news night after night, they will know that the bbc doesn't broadcast the worst of what is happening. if you compare us to some of the arabic language networks here in the middle east,

even some national channels, we don't...we really do try to protect our audiences from the very, very worst, the most shocking, while still conveying just how bad it is. these are very difficult, very difficult calls, and especially for films which go out on the 1:00 news, when children could be watching, similarly, the 6:00, the 10:00 news, perhaps they can show a bit more. and so it was put on 9:00 in the evening. of course, it's on iplayer, which means you can watch it any time. but it was, it was a judgment, but i think it's an importantjudgment. you also know that the bbc�*s got lots of accusations of alleged bias, both being accused of being anti—israeli and accused of being anti—palestinian. can i ask in your reporting, how do you try to find balance and impartiality? i have to say that all of us

were stunned by the anger which unfolded across social media, the vitriol, the abuse, the technology has changed and the conflict has only gotten worse. and so, yes, we are accused of bias by the israelis, bias by palestinians, bias by people across the arab world and beyond. 0urjob is to ask as many questions as possible, get as close as possible to the truth, to try to reflect the views of what is happening on the ground. and after decades of covering conflict, i now believe that there is... that wars in particular, conflicts of any kind, unfold on two levels. there's a level of what is actually happening the who, when, what, where, why — the bedrock, the facts. then there is the perceptions of what has happened, and sometimes that's aligned with the facts and more often it's not. and in covering wars, i've come to understand that the perception of what is happening actually matters more and can determine

the course of a conflict even more than what really happened on the ground. one of the things we've been talking about is the need to be as close as you can to report the facts. like most bbcjournalists, you've not been in gaza, you're injerusalem. and we heard one viewerjust a little earlier saying that, does that mean the bbc�*s reporting is second hand? well, it is second hand. the bbc has been lobbying from the start, the israelis and the egyptians, to say that this is unprecedented, you must allow us access to gaza so we can report first—hand. of course, there was reporting on the ground. we had our own people. we had rushdi abu aluf, our correspondent, we had our bbc arabic colleagues. but eventually the dangers for them, for their families became such they simply couldn't do theirjob and keep themselves safe.

so like many other news organisations, we had to take them out to safety. aside from short, carefully controlled embeds with the israeli military, we haven't had access to the ground. and it shows! we try very, very hard, we work with trusted freelancers. we assign correspondents who just work on gaza so that we can try to put a human face on the numbers, which are staggering. they're numbing. and so we can give the equal weight, the weight to the intensity and the pain and the suffering of what is happening in gaza, because it is also of enormous proportions, unprecedented proportions. lyse doucet, thank you so much. the inquiry into the post office horizon scandal, which came to particular national attention injanuary, resumed on tuesday. its star witness, alan bates, the campaigner forjustice for post office employees

like himself who were wrongly accused of fraud and theft. the news channel was showing him being questioned as the clock ticked towards 1:00. it dated, as you'll see, the 5th of october 2010, and the purpose of the document is a rescheduled meeting with you on the 7th of october. anchor: you're watching bbc news's special coverage of. the post office horizon it scandal. now, we've been hearing from alan bates, a former subpostmaster who has been fighting for accountability. now we will continue our coverage shortly. the live coverage of the inquiry didn't resume for more than an hour, prompting this reaction from, amongst others, greg bell. during the live feed of the post office inquiry shown on the bbc news channel on tuesday, coverage was abruptly terminated to switch to the 1:00 afternoon news, just as alan bates was about to discuss details of his correspondence with ed davey,

the present leader of the liberal democrats, who was minister in charge of the post office at the time. the 1:00 news is readily available on bbc one, so at�* such an interesting stage of the proceedings, and particularly as this case is by far the biggest miscarriage ofjustice ever witnessed in this country, why did you pull the plug? so why didn't the news channel continue live coverage of the inquiry while those who wanted a news bulletin could instead have turned over to bbc one? and more widely, why can't a dedicated stream or channel, perhaps bbc parliament, be given over to showing the inquiry uninterrupted? we asked bbc news and they told us...

finally, dominating tv news output on monday was the solar eclipse that appeared across parts of north america, prompting great excitement among those that witnessed it. nada tawfiq was one of the bbc�*s reporters on the spot. crowds on the beaches of mexico's west coast were the first to experience the astrological phenomenon as the moon passed in front of the sun, completely blocking its light. watching that was alberto nieto who sent us this video. finally, dominating tv news output on monday was the solar eclipse that appeared across parts of north america, prompting great excitement among those that witnessed it. nada tawfiq was one of the bbc�*s reporters on the spot. crowds on the beaches of mexico's west coast were the first to experience the astrological phenomenon as the moon passed in front of the sun, completely blocking its light. watching that was alberto nieto who sent us this video.

and the journalist was describing the crowds witnessing the astrological phenomenon, now, as an astronomy graduate, i've had to explain the difference between astrology and astronomy to my barber, but i would not have to explain this to a bbcjournalist. so this was recorded, it was not a live broadcast. it was not a slip of the tongue. so someone else must have vetted the content. come on, bbc adjectives are important. thank you for all your comments on adjectives and other matters this week. if you want to share your opinions about what you see or hear on bbc news, on tv, radio, online and social media, email us... or you can find us on x, formerly known as twitter. you can call us... and do have a look at previous interviews on our website. that's all from us for now. thank you forjoining us. do think about getting in touch and perhaps even

coming on the programme. we'll be back to hear more of your thoughts about how the bbc covers the news next week. goodbye.

now, let's talk drones. remember when drones were first on the scene? i do. loads and loads of hype. everyone wanted to have a go at flying them, often without training and usually in the wrong place. yeah. eventually, they did seem to find their niche, which is discovering things around the world that you might not otherwise be able to see and, of course, filming it so you can share it. and james clayton has been to meet a youtuber who may have recorded something fishy off the coast of california. she's out. look at that thing. you can see it good. carlos is a youtuber and shark fanatic who is frankly amazing at finding sharks with his drone. he's become an internet sensation, his videos racking up tens of millions of views. so from here, you'd have no idea there was a great white shark out there because it's almost impossible to see it from the beach. and that's why drones

are so important. so drones, when you're viewing a shark, you're not in the water with a shark, you're not swimming with a shark. you don't have a camera in the water that they can sense. you're basically viewing the sharks through a magnifying glass that they don't know is watching them. go. finding a shark, though, isn't always easy. so i know where to fly. ok, let's see if i can find this damn thing. they don't like the brown water. see, there's the shark right there. i see it! yeah. so as i go down to it... you'll be able to see. i'm rolling and recording this. it's about a nine—foot shark. i'm guessing it's about nine feet. yep. from the sky, carlos captures moments that would be hard to see with the naked eye. look, look! he's doing...

he's doing something. 0h, he's doing something. right, did you see him turn fast? mmm. he turned right back toward that kelp. oh, this is exciting. he's turning back toward it. filming with carlos is a pleasure, but i'm not the only one who wants to go out with him. scientists who are also interested in carlos's footage have taken an interest, including one local marine biologist who was with him when he filmed something he'd never seen before. | in the days both prior and the day| of, we had seen very large sharks. they had considerable girth on them. so it's a very wide—looking shark. so i'm like, "either that shark's | eating very well "or it might be j carrying some pups inside of it." female just...was acting erratically. she dove, disappeared. and guess what came up from underneath — this little bitty white, almost albino—looking white shark. i think the word albino was just shouting out of our mouths. i like, "albino, albino!" and then we start to zoom in on her. i'd never seen anything like this before. -