The journalist and presenter of BFMTV Rachid M’Barki, laid off for suspicion of foreign influence, collaborated with a vast enterprise of disinformation led by an Israeli pharmacy. This was revealed on Wednesday by an investigation by an international consortium of 100 journalists.
“There is no doubt that BFM is a victim in this story, when one of ours bypasses the hierarchical chain, that poses a problem”, reacted this Wednesday the general manager of the info channel, Marc-Olivier. Fogiel, on France Inter, after having launched an internal investigation and suspended the 54-year-old journalist.
Subjects “provided turnkey on behalf of foreign customers”
According to this investigation by the collective of journalists Forbidden Stories, to which the investigation unit of Radio France and The world, this case is linked to a disinformation company run by an Israeli company known as “Team Jorge”, which would sell its services around the world. According to a manager of this pharmacy in Israel, this company can automatically create fake online accounts, automatically generate content on social networks or hack emails or Telegram accounts, in order to influence election campaigns in particular.
In the case of Rachid M’Barki on BFMTV, the briefs broadcast related to the Russian oligarchs, in Qatar, in Sudan, in Cameroon, or even in Western Sahara and would have been “provided turnkey on behalf of foreign clients”, according to the investigative consortium. The first news channel in France had opened an internal investigation in January due to suspicions against Rachid M’Barki.
According to Marc-Olivier Fogiel, the presenter “managed to ask [des] last-minute images” to illustrate briefs, “once the editor-in-chief was taken on another installment and had validated his entire newspaper”. Questioned in January by the site PoliticoRachid M’Barki admitted to having “used information that [lui] came from informants” and who “did not necessarily follow the usual course of writing”.