BBC Gaza Film Ruled a 'Serious' Violation of Broadcasting Rules, States UK Media Regulator
The British broadcaster engaged in a "serious breach" of media regulations by omitting to mention that the narrator of a documentary about the Gaza situation was the child of a Hamas administrator, as ruled by British broadcasting authority Ofcom.
An inquiry by the broadcasting watchdog into Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has concluded that the film was "significantly deceptive".
The head of the BBC had previously apologised, noting there had been "a major oversight in relation to accuracy".
Ofcom has instructed the BBC to transmit a evening declaration about its conclusions.
"Since this amounts to a serious breach of our code, we are directing the broadcaster to air a statement of our determinations against it on the BBC's second channel at 21:00, with a schedule to be confirmed," the statement read.
'Risk to Damage Credibility'
The watchdog's report stated: "Our probe concluded that the programme's failure to disclose that the voice's parent held a post in the Hamas-administered authority was substantially inaccurate.
"This implied that the public did not have essential details which may have been highly relevant to their evaluation of the presenter and the information he presented.
"Credibility is at the core of the connection between a media organization and its public, particularly for a state-funded media outlet such as the British Broadcasting Corporation.
"This failing had the possibility to damage the very considerable amounts of trust that audiences would have placed in a BBC factual programme about the conflict in Gaza."
The film was withdrawn from the BBC's streaming service in the month of February after the boy's personal associations were revealed, and in this past July an corporation's own inquiry found it infringed the corporation's content policies on truthfulness.
A corporation official stated: "The authority's determination is in agreement with the results of the internal assessment, that there was a major oversight in the programme in relation to the broadcaster's journalistic policies on truthfulness, which aligns with regulation 2.2 of the regulator's media standards.
"We expressed regret for this and we accept the authority's determination in its entirety. We will comply with the penalty as soon as the timing and language are determined."
