ABC chair Kim Williams has hit out at “inflammatory” and “divisive” media critics after News Corp published a piece attacking the national broadcaster’s coverage of Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza.
Asked about a piece published in The Australian at the weekend under the online headline “ABC reporting on Gaza war failed nation, feeding into demonisation of Israel, fuelling antisemitism”, Williams issued a scathing statement.
“Reporting that is highly charged and inflammatory, or lacking in evidence is divisive, undermines community cohesion and does not contribute to an informed or reasoned public debate,” said Williams. “This is especially important when dealing with the recent sensitivities.”
Written by Sky News host and Australian associate editor Chris Kenny, the piece was based on a report by “four anonymous Victorians” who analysed ABC content. It included several examples that Kenny argued showed the ABC was biased against Israel.
In print, the headline read “How ABC’s Gaza coverage fuelled antisemitism”. A subheading claimed the broadcaster’s “distorted reporting” had contributed to a climate of hostility to Jews.
News Corp outlets have previously also run pieces and segments critical of ABC hosts’ questioning on antisemitism.
Williams, who is a former chief executive of News Corp in Australia, said the broadcaster expected robust scrutiny as a public institution. The few errors the ABC had made in its reporting had been acknowledged and quickly corrected, he said.
But, Williams said, scrutiny must be “evidence-based and objective, including when assessing the ABC”.
“Recent commercial media has accused the ABC of bias and as having contributed to the rise of antisemitism. The ABC stands by its reporting of the conflict in the Middle East,” Williams said.
As well as issuing the public statement, Williams contacted News Corp Australia executive chair Michael Miller regarding Kenny’s article, according to sources with knowledge of the matter who spoke on condition of anonymity.
The bulk of Kenny’s piece was based on a submission to the Royal Commission into Antisemitism and Social Cohesion, which he described as coming from “four anonymous Victorians”. This masthead has learnt that an author of the full report referenced in The Australian’s news story has previously compiled similar analyses critical of the ABC, according to an article from the conservative journal Quadrant. He was contacted for comment.
When contacted for comment, the Australian group’s contact address attached to the report said it was an “unregistered association of volunteers” who felt “compelled to expose what we believe to be systematic inaccuracies and misleading coverage by the ABC in its reporting on the Hamas war against Israel”.
Kenny said his column was detailed and accurate. “The submission was anonymous, but I spoke with one of the authors to ascertain its veracity – the quality of its research, all carefully cited, sourced and referenced, was first-rate,” Kenny said. “I happen to agree wholeheartedly with its thesis because I have reported exhaustively on the ABC’s anti-Israel bias over many years, despite ABC attempts to silence me.”
“Kim Williams,” Kenny said, “ought to turn his sights onto ABC editorial standards – the job for which he is paid by taxpayers – rather than practising anti-journalism against the ABC’s critics.”
The Australian’s editor, Michelle Gunn, was contacted for comment.
In his article, Kenny called on the royal commission, which was established this year after the Bondi terror attack on a Hanukkah celebration that claimed the lives of 15 people, to consider the report and examine media bias.
Among the coverage Kenny criticised was the ABC’s use of an image, which came to prominence when it was published by The New York Times in July 2025, of a child called Muhammad Zakariya Ayyoub al-Matouq who appeared emaciated due to a lack of food in Gaza.
After the publication of the image, The Times issued an editor’s note stating the child was also suffering from pre-existing health conditions. This masthead issued a similar note. The ABC updated its story with an editor’s note, too, flagging the additional details of the child’s health, but said, “the material facts of the story remain the same”.
The ABC is preparing to make its own submission to the royal commission.
According to the ABC’s independent ombudsman, its coverage of the war and conflict in the Middle East was the most complained about subject in 2024-2025 financial year. Fifty per cent of complaints cited the ABC’s coverage as pro-Palestinian, while 45 per cent cited coverage as pro-Israel.
The ombudsman said: “While tempting to suggest concern is being expressed in rough equivalence between support for Palestine or Israel, the statistics are more a reflection of a growing and organised expression of audience bias.
“The ABC has not always got it right, but mistakes have been few when considering the
comprehensive coverage provided across multiple channels.”
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Calum Jaspan is a media writer for The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age, based in Melbourne. Reach him securely on Signal @calumjaspan.10Connect via X or email.
