British Broadcasting Corporation Gaza Film Deemed a 'Serious' Breach of Broadcasting Regulations, States UK Media Regulator
The BBC was found to have committed a "significant breach" of industry standards by omitting to mention that the voice of a programme about the Gaza situation was the offspring of a Hamas official, as ruled by regulatory body Ofcom.
An investigation by Ofcom into the programme Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has determined that the documentary was "substantially inaccurate".
The BBC's director general had already issued an apology, saying there had been "a serious error in relation to truthfulness".
The authority has ordered the BBC to broadcast a evening statement about its decisions.
"As this represents a major infringement of our rules, we are ordering the corporation to air a message of our findings against it on BBC Two at 21:00, with a date to be determined," the regulator stated.
'Possibility to Damage Credibility'
The regulator's statement said: "Our investigation determined that the programme's omission to reveal that the presenter's male guardian held a role in the Hamas-controlled administration was significantly deceptive.
"Consequently that the viewers did not have essential details which may have been very significant to their assessment of the narrator and the information he provided.
"Credibility is at the core of the relationship between a broadcaster and its audience, especially for a public service broadcaster such as the BBC.
"This error had the risk to erode the exceptionally strong levels of confidence that viewers would have put in a BBC factual programme about the conflict in Gaza."
The documentary was removed from the BBC's streaming service in last February after the narrator's familial connections were revealed, and in the month of July an corporation's own inquiry determined it violated the broadcaster's journalistic standards on accuracy.
A representative for the broadcaster commented: "The regulator's decision is in line with the results of the internal assessment, that there was a serious error in the film in relation to the broadcaster's journalistic policies on truthfulness, which corresponds to regulation 2.2 of the regulator's media standards.
"We expressed regret for this and we comply with Ofcom's decision in its entirety. We will comply with the penalty as soon as the timing and wording are determined."
