BBC Gaza Film Deemed a 'Major' Infringement of Media Rules, Says Broadcasting Watchdog
The British broadcaster engaged in a "serious breach" of industry standards by omitting to mention that the voice of a documentary about the Gaza situation was the offspring of a Hamas representative, as determined by UK media regulator Ofcom.
An investigation by the media regulator into the documentary titled Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has found that the programme was "significantly deceptive".
The head of the BBC had already issued an apology, saying there had been "a significant failing in relation to truthfulness".
The regulator has instructed the broadcaster to broadcast a prime-time declaration about its conclusions.
"Since this amounts to a major infringement of our rules, we are ordering the broadcaster to broadcast a statement of our findings against it on BBC Two at 21:00, with a schedule to be determined," the regulator stated.
'Risk to Erode Confidence'
The watchdog's report declared: "The inquiry we conducted found that the programme's omission to reveal that the voice's parent held a position in the Hamas-run government was materially misleading.
"Consequently that the public did not have critical information which may have been extremely pertinent to their evaluation of the presenter and the details he shared.
"Credibility is at the heart of the connection between a media organization and its public, notably for a public service broadcaster such as the BBC.
"This failing had the risk to erode the significantly high degrees of trust that audiences would have invested in a documentary produced by the BBC about the conflict in Gaza."
The programme was withdrawn from the online platform in last February after the narrator's family links came to light, and in the month of July an broadcaster's internal assessment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 content policies on factual correctness.
A representative for the broadcaster stated: "The regulator's decision is in agreement with the results of the corporation's inquiry, that there was a major oversight in the programme in relation to the corporation's content standards on accuracy, which corresponds to clause 2.2 of the authority's broadcasting regulations.
"We expressed regret for this and we accept Ofcom's decision in full. We will comply with the directive as soon as the date and language are determined."
