Donald Trump is a bare-faced liar and it feels liberating to say so, Jeremy Bowen has declared during a discussion about BBC impartiality.

Bowen said that while the BBC is committed to impartial reporting, it is important to tell viewers empirical truths such as correcting the US president’s “nonsense” claim that Ukraine started the war with Russia.

Speaking at the Hay Festival, the BBC’s long-serving Middle East editor discussed the efforts by President Trump and JD Vance, the vice-president, to humiliate Volodomyr Zelensky during their Oval Office showdown in February.

A Western official had described the encounter to Bowen as “a diplomatic mugging”.

‘Breathtakingly obvious’

Bowen said: “Everyone saw the way they hectored him, humiliated him. They were coming out with absolute nonsense, things like ‘Zelensky started the war’.

“So I made a point on air – on the Today programme, the 10 O’Clock News, the website and other places – I made this point to the management, saying we have to use the right language. I said it’s very important to use the word ‘lie’. It’s not ‘this is how Trump works, it’s the art of the deal…’

“I said, no, he’s the president of the United States, what he says matters and it’s our job, if he comes up with something that’s not just an exaggeration but a bare-faced lie, to say that.

“It was actually rather liberating. I was quite gobsmacked, when I started doing it, that I got tons of messages from people – members of the public and people who are in the media business – saying, ‘well done, Jeremy, for saying that.’ 

“And I was thinking, God, it seems breathtakingly obvious we should be saying that. I’m a big fan of direct language.”

Bowen said his branding of the president as a liar did not clash with the BBC’s commitment to impartiality.

He added: “If I’m saying things on air, I need to feel justified that they’re based on empirical observations. Impartiality does not mean, ‘well, he says that and he says that and the truth lies somewhere in between’

Calling Hamas terrorists does not ‘illuminate’

Bowen went on to defend the BBC’s decision not to use the word ‘terrorists’ when referring to Hamas.

He said: “The point about using the word: people apply it in all kinds of different ways. It doesn’t necessarily make you wiser. For me, it’s better to explain what people are doing rather than simply tag them.

“The old phrase, ‘one man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter’ – the leadership of pre-state Israel, when they were fighting the British, were regarded as terrorists. 

“The two prime terrorists in the eyes of the British in the 1940s were Menachem Begin and Yitzhak Shamir, who headed organisations that were carrying weapons against the British.

“Begin’s organisation blew up the King David Hotel in Jerusalem, which was the headquarters of the British at the time. They later became the prime ministers of their country and were welcomed to No 10 Downing Street.

“Using those words does not illuminate, in my view, so I very much support BBC policy, but I know it’s controversial.”

Bowen also criticised the Israeli government for barring foreign journalists from entering Gaza.

He said of visiting a kibbutz attacked on Oct 7: “The Israelis took us in there because, quite justifiably and rightly, they wanted us to see what Hamas had done. It was important to see that. Hamas had done appalling, appalling things.

“Question: why won’t they let us go into Gaza? It’s because there are things that they have done there they don’t want us to see. It is all we can conclude.”