BBC Gaza Documentary Deemed a 'Significant' Breach of Broadcasting Regulations, States UK Media Regulator
The BBC was found to have committed a "major breach" of media regulations by omitting to mention that the narrator of a film about the Gaza situation was the child of a Hamas administrator, as determined by UK media regulator Ofcom.
An investigation by the media regulator into the programme Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has determined that the film was "materially misleading".
The BBC's director general had earlier expressed regret, saying there had been "a significant failing in relation to accuracy".
The regulator has instructed the BBC to air a evening statement about its decisions.
"Since this amounts to a major infringement of our code, we are ordering the broadcaster to transmit a message of our findings against it on the BBC's second channel at 9pm, with a date to be confirmed," it said.
'Potential to Damage Credibility'
The watchdog's announcement declared: "Our probe concluded that the programme's omission to reveal that the narrator's parent occupied a post in the Hamas-run government was significantly deceptive.
"This implied that the public did not have essential details which may have been extremely pertinent to their evaluation of the voice and the details he presented.
"Trust is at the center of the connection between a television network and its viewers, especially for a national broadcasting corporation such as the British Broadcasting Corporation.
"This failing had the risk to damage the very considerable levels of credibility that the public would have put in a factual film from the broadcaster about the Israel-Gaza war."
The programme was pulled from the BBC's streaming service in the month of February after the boy's familial connections came to light, and in this past July an internal BBC review concluded it violated the corporation's editorial guidelines on truthfulness.
A representative for the broadcaster commented: "The Ofcom ruling is in line with the findings of the corporation's inquiry, that there was a major oversight in the documentary in relation to the BBC's Editorial Guidelines on factual correctness, which aligns with Rule 2.2 of the authority's broadcasting regulations.
"We issued an apology for this and we agree with the regulator's ruling in its entirety. We will adhere to the sanction as soon as the date and wording are confirmed."
