BBC Gaza Film Deemed a 'Serious' Infringement of Media Regulations, States Broadcasting Watchdog
The BBC committed a "serious breach" of industry standards by failing to disclose that the narrator of a documentary about the Gaza conflict was the offspring of a Hamas official, according to UK media regulator Ofcom.
An probe by the media regulator into Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has concluded that the programme was "materially misleading".
The BBC's director general had previously apologised, noting there had been "a major oversight in relation to factual correctness".
Ofcom has instructed the broadcaster to air a peak-time announcement about its decisions.
"As this represents a significant violation of our regulations, we are ordering the corporation to transmit a statement of our findings against it on the BBC's second channel at 21:00, with a timing to be determined," it said.
'Potential to Erode Confidence'
The regulator's report declared: "Our investigation found that the film's omission to reveal that the voice's father occupied a role in the Hamas-administered government was substantially inaccurate.
"It meant that the viewers did not have essential details which may have been highly relevant to their evaluation of the voice and the details he presented.
"Credibility is at the heart of the connection between a broadcaster and its viewers, particularly for a state-funded media outlet such as the BBC.
"This error had the possibility to damage the very considerable amounts of trust that the public would have placed in a documentary produced by the BBC about the conflict in Gaza."
The programme was pulled from the online platform in last February after the narrator's family links came to light, and in the month of July an broadcaster's internal assessment concluded it violated the corporation's journalistic standards on truthfulness.
A corporation official said: "The Ofcom ruling is in accordance with the results of the corporation's inquiry, that there was a significant failing in the documentary in relation to the corporation's content standards on truthfulness, which reflects regulation 2.2 of the regulator's media standards.
"We expressed regret for this and we comply with Ofcom's decision in complete. We will comply with the directive as soon as the timing and language are determined."
