BBC Gaza Documentary Ruled a 'Major' Infringement of Media Rules, Says Broadcasting Watchdog
The British broadcaster engaged in a "serious breach" of media regulations by omitting to mention that the voice of a programme about the Gaza situation was the son of a Hamas official, as ruled by UK media regulator Ofcom.
An inquiry by the media regulator into the programme Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has concluded that the programme was "significantly deceptive".
The BBC's director general had previously apologised, stating there had been "a major oversight in relation to truthfulness".
The authority has directed the broadcaster to air a prime-time statement about its findings.
"Given this constitutes a serious breach of our rules, we are instructing the corporation to broadcast a announcement of our determinations against it on the BBC's second channel at nine o'clock in the evening, with a schedule to be determined," the statement read.
'Possibility to Undermine Credibility'
The watchdog's statement said: "Our probe found that the film's failure to disclose that the narrator's parent occupied a post in the Hamas-controlled government was significantly deceptive.
"It meant that the viewers did not have vital facts which may have been highly relevant to their judgment of the narrator and the details he provided.
"Confidence is at the core of the bond between a broadcaster and its public, especially for a state-funded media outlet such as the British Broadcasting Corporation.
"This failing had the possibility to damage the very considerable amounts of confidence that audiences would have placed in a documentary produced by the BBC about the conflict in Gaza."
The film was withdrawn from the online platform in February after the boy's familial connections emerged, and in the month of July an corporation's own inquiry determined it violated the broadcaster's editorial guidelines on accuracy.
A BBC spokesperson commented: "The regulator's decision is in agreement with the conclusions of Peter Johnston's review, that there was a serious error in the programme in relation to the BBC's Editorial Guidelines on factual correctness, which aligns with Rule 2.2 of the authority's broadcasting regulations.
"We expressed regret for this and we comply with the regulator's ruling in complete. We will adhere to the sanction as soon as the schedule and wording are confirmed."
