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The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) Persian misinterpreted part of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s speech on Monday in Iran, making it appear that the United States was targeting the Iranian “people” instead of the Iranian “state”.
When BBC Persian broadcast the military secretary’s speech to an audience inside Iran, the network misinterpreted the word “state” as “mardom,” which means “people” in Persian.
This mix-up made the audience believe that the Iranian people were being targeted by the US, when in fact, Hegseth had said that the Iranian regime was being targeted by American forces.
United States Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth speaks during a visit to Sierra Space in Louisville, Colorado on Monday, Feb. 23, 2026. (Aaron Ontiveros/The Denver Post)
“It turns out that the regime that chanted ‘death to America and death to Israel’ was gifted with death to America and death from Israel. This is not a so-called regime-change war, but the regime has changed and the world is better for it,” Hegseth said.
When the network was translated into Persian, the speech of the secretary of war said: “It turns out that the people who chanted ‘death to America and death to Israel’ had the gift of death to America and death to Israel.”
The BBC has issued a correction.
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“This mistranslated word was a mistake, due to human error, during the live simultaneous translation of the speech. We issued corrections to the Persian audience on air and on social media,” the network said in a statement.
As reported by The Telegraph, Iran expert and Persian linguist Thamar Eilam-Gindin said the BBC had “changed the meaning” of Hegseth’s speech.
A security guard walks outside the BBC headquarters in central London, Britain, on March 11, 2023. (Reuters/Henry Nicholls)
“By mistranslating the English word ‘regime’ into the Persian word ‘mardom’ – meaning ‘the people’ – the BBC’s Persian service changed the meaning of the US defense secretary’s speech, making it appear that he was attacking all Iranians instead of the Islamic Republic,” he explained.
“Among members of the Iranian diaspora in the West, with whom I often communicate, this incident reinforces what they see as the regime’s long-standing agenda in BBC Persian.”
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When reached for comment on the error, the BBC pointed to Fox News Digital in its initial statement.
The BBC Persian X account also posted a correction: The English text of the video post said, “Correction and Explanation with Simultaneous Translation of US Defense Secretary’s Remarks.”
The network’s translation error comes amid a $10 billion lawsuit against the BBC from President Donald Trump.
The BBC is eyeing a 2024 Panorama film about Trump’s Jan. 6, 2021, which was presented before this riot at the US Capitol. Critics say the documentary is misleading because it left out Trump’s call for supporters to protest peacefully. Trump sued the BBC in December for both defamation and violating Florida’s Deceptive Commerce Act for $5 billion each, seeking $10 billion.
President Donald Trump gives a speech at the Coosa Steel Corporation plant in Rome, Georgia, on Feb. 19, 2026. (Saul Loeb/AFP)
While ABC and CBS both settled lawsuits with Trump last year, the BBC vowed to fight the case. Both parties agreed on John W. Thornton, Esq., to serve as pretrial arbitrator, who will seek a verdict.
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“The BBC defamed President Trump by deliberately and fraudulently editing its documentary to try to interfere in the Presidential election. President Trump will continue to prosecute those who peddle lies, deception and fake news,” a spokesperson for Trump’s legal team told Fox News Digital.
The BBC did not respond to an earlier request for comment on the case.
Brian Flood of Fox News Digital contributed to this report.
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