Syrian channel accidentally airs performance by Israeli sports team
Sport 24's broadcast of 2012 Summer Olympics in London showed Israeli women's gymnastics team perform at the tournament despite orders for all images of Israel to be censored, prompting may Syrian viewers to take to social media to express their anger.
The broadcast was apparently supposed to censor the performance by the Israeli team—which finished in eighth place in the tournament.
The images of Israelis on national television prompted many enraged Syrian viewers to take to social media to express their frustration, with many going as far as to appeal to the Syrian Ministry of Communication.
The channel was quick to issue an apology, blaming the situation on "human error."
"An examination carried out by the channel's management revealed that the tournament was broadcast without permission. It’s a grave mistake, and we apologize to our viewers. We will take the necessary steps to prevent such negligence from occuring in the future,” the channel said in a statement.
Arabic-speaking channels have been regularly cutting out Israeli athletes and national Israeli symbols from their broadcasts.
The latest in the series of such incidents took place during the FINA Swimming World Cup in Qatar in 2018, when the Israeli flag was digitally removed from a swimming track of Israeli Olympic swimmer Amit Ivry.
