British Broadcasting Corporation Gaza Documentary Ruled a 'Serious' Infringement of Broadcasting Standards, States UK Media Regulator
The British broadcaster engaged in a "major breach" of broadcasting rules by omitting to mention that the narrator of a programme about the Gaza conflict was the child of a Hamas administrator, as determined by regulatory body Ofcom.
An probe by Ofcom into the programme Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has concluded that the documentary was "significantly deceptive".
The BBC's director general had already issued an apology, noting there had been "a significant failing in relation to factual correctness".
Ofcom has ordered the BBC to broadcast a prime-time declaration about its decisions.
"Since this amounts to a serious breach of our regulations, we are directing the BBC to air a statement of our findings against it on the BBC's second channel at 9pm, with a date to be finalised," the regulator stated.
'Risk to Erode Confidence'
The authority's announcement stated: "Our investigation concluded that the programme's lack of disclosure that the narrator's parent held a position in the Hamas-administered government was materially misleading.
"Consequently that the audience did not have critical information which may have been extremely pertinent to their assessment of the presenter and the content he presented.
"Credibility is at the core of the connection between a television network and its public, particularly for a state-funded media outlet such as the BBC.
"This error had the potential to undermine the significantly high levels of trust that viewers would have put in a factual film from the broadcaster about the conflict in Gaza."
The programme was withdrawn from iPlayer in February after the narrator's familial connections were revealed, and in this past July an corporation's own inquiry determined it breached the broadcaster's journalistic standards on factual correctness.
A corporation official said: "The authority's determination is in accordance with the conclusions of the internal assessment, that there was a major oversight in the film in relation to the broadcaster's journalistic policies on accuracy, which corresponds to Rule 2.2 of the regulator's media standards.
"We issued an apology for this and we agree with Ofcom's decision in complete. We will follow the directive as soon as the date and wording are determined."
