BBC Gaza Film Deemed a 'Serious' Infringement of Broadcasting Rules, States UK Media Regulator
The BBC was found to have committed a "major breach" of industry standards by failing to disclose that the narrator of a film about the Gaza conflict was the son of a Hamas administrator, as determined by British broadcasting authority Ofcom.
An probe by Ofcom into Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has determined that the film was "materially misleading".
The BBC's director general had already issued an apology, noting there had been "a major oversight in relation to factual correctness".
Ofcom has directed the corporation to air a evening declaration about its conclusions.
"As this represents a significant violation of our rules, we are directing the corporation to broadcast a announcement of our conclusions against it on BBC2 at 21:00, with a timing to be confirmed," the regulator stated.
'Possibility to Damage Trust'
The regulator's statement stated: "The inquiry we conducted concluded that the film's lack of disclosure that the narrator's parent held a role in the Hamas-run authority was substantially inaccurate.
"Consequently that the public did not have essential details which may have been very significant to their evaluation of the narrator and the content he presented.
"Confidence is at the heart of the bond between a broadcaster and its audience, especially for a state-funded media outlet such as the public broadcaster.
"This oversight had the risk to undermine the exceptionally strong degrees of credibility that the public would have invested in a factual film from the broadcaster about the Israel-Gaza war."
The programme was removed from the online platform in the month of February after the presenter's familial connections came to light, and in July an corporation's own inquiry concluded it violated the broadcaster's content policies on accuracy.
A corporation official commented: "The authority's determination is in line with the results of the corporation's inquiry, that there was a serious error in the documentary in relation to the broadcaster's journalistic policies on accuracy, which corresponds to regulation 2.2 of Ofcom's Broadcasting Code.
"We expressed regret for this and we comply with Ofcom's decision in complete. We will follow the sanction as soon as the timing and wording are determined."
