"Once again, the Jewish community has been failed by the BBC."
Calls have been made for the BBC to axe episodes of The Apprentice featuring Dr Asif Munaf, who is accused of making a “stream of anti-Jewish comments” on social media.
The doctor received a diversity and inclusion training course from the BBC over such posts before the show aired.
However, Asif has continued to make anti-semitic remarks and has appeared in the first two episodes of The Apprentice.
His comments include tweeting in response to someone who had asked about his offensive comments after his casting in The Apprentice was confirmed.
The comment read: “Standard bitter Zionist crawling out from underneath her rock.”
Danny Cohen, the former director of BBC Television, called for the doctor to be axed from the show.
Writing in The Telegraph, Mr Cohen said:
“The BBC’s inaction sends a message.
“You can be racist towards Jews and there are no consequences.
“You can enjoy fame on the BBC even if you are the kind of person whose views painfully remind Jewish viewers of Nazi propaganda.
“Once again, the Jewish community has been failed by the BBC.”
Mr Cohen’s plea came after Asif Munaf posted a “grotesquely” anti-semitic comment that accused Israel of weaponising the Holocaust to promote a fascist ideology after going on the BBC course.
In 2023, he tweeted that Zionists were a “godless, satanic cult” and said of his children:
“I pray they are strong enough physically, spiritually and psychologically to overcome the trial of the Zionist antichrist.”
He has also used his platform to promote the University of Masculinity, which has previously retweeted a series of posts by controversial influencer Andrew Tate.
Asif Munaf has also faced a sexism storm after it was revealed that he started a service to find British Muslim men brides abroad.
A spokesperson for the BBC show has now said that after filming took place, they were made aware of “concerns over social media posts that Asif had made after he had left the process”.
They said: “As soon as we were alerted, we took immediate action and spoke to Asif in detail on this.
“Asif took part in specialised training to understand why his posts may cause offence.”
“We are committed to providing an inclusive environment on and off screen.”
In a statement, Asif apologised for “any offence caused” by his social media posts.
He said: “It was not my intention to offend anyone, and I am of course open to all views.
“The beliefs I hold and have shared are based on the values that I was brought up with.”
The Apprentice is currently going into its third week.
Asif and the boys have lost the first two challenges and Asif found himself in the bottom three following the failure of the second task.
Loading ...