British Broadcasting Corporation Gaza Documentary Deemed a 'Major' Breach of Broadcasting Standards, Declares Broadcasting Watchdog
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 conflict was the son of a Hamas administrator, according to regulatory body Ofcom.
An investigation by the broadcasting watchdog into Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has determined that the film was "substantially inaccurate".
The BBC's director general had previously apologised, noting there had been "a major oversight in relation to accuracy".
Ofcom has directed the BBC to transmit a prime-time statement about its findings.
"As this represents a significant violation of our rules, we are ordering the BBC to transmit a message of our conclusions against it on the BBC's second channel at nine o'clock in the evening, with a schedule to be finalised," the regulator stated.
'Possibility to Damage Credibility'
The authority's statement stated: "Our probe found that the documentary's lack of disclosure that the voice's parent held a post in the Hamas-run administration was materially misleading.
"It meant that the public did not have vital facts which may have been highly relevant to their evaluation of the narrator and the content he provided.
"Trust is at the heart of the bond between a media organization and its viewers, particularly for a state-funded media outlet such as the British Broadcasting Corporation.
"This error had the risk to damage the exceptionally strong degrees of confidence that audiences would have placed in a factual film from the broadcaster about the conflict in Gaza."
The programme was pulled from the BBC's streaming service in the month of February after the narrator's personal associations came to light, and in July an internal BBC review determined it violated the organization's editorial guidelines on accuracy.
A representative for the broadcaster stated: "The Ofcom ruling is in accordance with the results of Peter Johnston's review, that there was a serious error in the programme in relation to the BBC's Editorial Guidelines on factual correctness, which reflects Rule 2.2 of Ofcom's Broadcasting Code.
"We have apologised for this and we comply with the regulator's ruling in complete. We will adhere to the sanction as soon as the schedule and wording are determined."
