BBC Gaza Film Deemed a 'Major' Infringement of Broadcasting Standards, Declares Broadcasting Watchdog
The BBC was found to have committed a "significant breach" of media regulations by not revealing that the narrator of a programme about the Gaza conflict was the offspring of a Hamas administrator, as determined by British broadcasting authority Ofcom.
An probe by the broadcasting watchdog into Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has determined that the documentary was "substantially inaccurate".
The BBC's director general had earlier expressed regret, saying there had been "a significant failing in relation to accuracy".
Ofcom has ordered the broadcaster to transmit a peak-time declaration about its conclusions.
"Given this constitutes a serious breach of our rules, we are instructing the BBC to transmit a statement of our determinations against it on the BBC's second channel at nine o'clock in the evening, with a timing to be finalised," the regulator stated.
'Risk to Erode Confidence'
The authority's announcement said: "Our investigation determined that the programme's lack of disclosure that the voice's parent occupied a position in the Hamas-run administration was significantly deceptive.
"This implied that the viewers did not have essential details which may have been extremely pertinent to their assessment of the voice and the details he provided.
"Confidence is at the center of the relationship between a television network and its viewers, especially for a state-funded media outlet such as the British Broadcasting Corporation.
"This error had the risk to damage the significantly high levels of credibility that audiences would have placed in a BBC factual programme about the Israel-Gaza war."
The film was withdrawn from the BBC's streaming service in the month of February after the presenter's familial connections came to light, and in the month of July an internal BBC review concluded it breached the organization's editorial guidelines on accuracy.
A corporation official stated: "The regulator's decision is in line with the conclusions of the corporation's inquiry, that there was a major oversight in the documentary in relation to the corporation's content standards on factual correctness, which corresponds to clause 2.2 of the authority's broadcasting regulations.
"We expressed regret for this and we accept the regulator's ruling in full. We will adhere to the sanction as soon as the schedule and wording are determined."