British Broadcasting Corporation Gaza Programme Deemed a 'Major' Violation of Broadcasting Regulations, States Broadcasting Watchdog
The British broadcaster engaged in a "major breach" of industry standards by omitting to mention that the narrator of a documentary about the Gaza conflict was the son of a Hamas official, according to UK media regulator Ofcom.
An probe by Ofcom into the documentary titled Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has found that the documentary was "substantially inaccurate".
The head of the BBC had already issued an apology, stating there had been "a serious error in relation to truthfulness".
The authority has directed the broadcaster to air a evening declaration about its decisions.
"As this represents a major infringement of our rules, we are ordering the broadcaster to transmit a statement of our conclusions against it on BBC Two at 9pm, with a date to be confirmed," it said.
'Risk to Damage Trust'
The regulator's report said: "Our investigation found that the documentary's failure to disclose that the presenter's parent served in a post in the Hamas-administered administration was materially misleading.
"Consequently that the viewers did not have vital facts which may have been very significant to their assessment of the presenter and the details he shared.
"Credibility is at the core of the connection between a broadcaster and its public, particularly for a national broadcasting corporation such as the British Broadcasting Corporation.
"This failing had the possibility to undermine the exceptionally strong degrees of credibility that viewers would have put in a BBC factual programme about the Gaza conflict."
The film was withdrawn from the BBC's streaming service in February after the presenter's family links came to light, and in this past July an internal BBC review found it violated the organization's content policies on truthfulness.
A representative for the broadcaster said: "The authority's determination is in accordance with the findings of Peter Johnston's review, that there was a significant failing in the film in relation to the broadcaster's journalistic policies on truthfulness, which aligns with Rule 2.2 of the regulator's media standards.
"We issued an apology for this and we accept Ofcom's decision in complete. We will adhere to the directive as soon as the timing and wording are determined."
