The BBC has issued a bizarre statement responding to complaints concerning their coverage of the Israeli Olympics team. The Beeb caused a stir last week by apparently mistakenly suggesting that Israel had no capital city, a story picked up by several newspapers and online publications.

An innocent error perhaps, but a letter to a viewer from the BBC‘s complaints department had one particularly suspicious line: “we feel it is worth explaining that a considerable number of complaints have been generated by online lobby activity“. Which “lobby” could they possibly be referring to?