British Broadcasting Corporation Gaza Film Considered a 'Serious' Breach of Broadcasting Standards, Declares Broadcasting Watchdog
The British broadcaster engaged in a "significant 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 regulatory body Ofcom.
An inquiry by the media regulator into the programme Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has found that the film was "materially misleading".
The head of the BBC had already issued an apology, stating there had been "a serious error in relation to accuracy".
The authority has instructed the BBC to broadcast a peak-time statement about its findings.
"As this represents a significant violation of our regulations, we are ordering the broadcaster to transmit a announcement of our conclusions against it on BBC2 at nine o'clock in the evening, with a schedule to be finalised," the regulator stated.
'Potential to Erode Credibility'
The watchdog's announcement stated: "Our investigation found that the programme's failure to disclose that the narrator's male guardian held a post in the Hamas-controlled administration was significantly deceptive.
"Consequently that the public did not have essential details which may have been very significant to their judgment of the presenter and the information he presented.
"Credibility is at the core of the relationship between a media organization and its audience, notably for a state-funded media outlet such as the British Broadcasting Corporation.
"This oversight had the risk to undermine the exceptionally strong levels of credibility that audiences would have placed in a documentary produced by the BBC about the conflict in Gaza."
The programme was removed from the BBC's streaming service in February after the narrator's familial connections emerged, and in this past July an broadcaster's internal assessment found it violated the broadcaster's editorial guidelines on accuracy.
A corporation official said: "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 reflects Rule 2.2 of the authority's broadcasting regulations.
"We issued an apology for this and we agree with the authority's determination in complete. We will follow the penalty as soon as the timing and wording are determined."
