British Broadcasting Corporation Gaza Programme Considered a 'Significant' Violation of Broadcasting Regulations, States UK Media Regulator
The BBC committed a "significant breach" of industry standards by failing to disclose that the voice of a documentary about the Gaza conflict was the son of a Hamas representative, as determined by UK media regulator Ofcom.
An investigation by Ofcom into the documentary titled Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has found that the documentary was "substantially inaccurate".
The BBC's director general had already issued an apology, noting there had been "a significant failing in relation to accuracy".
The regulator has directed the BBC to air a evening announcement about its decisions.
"Since this amounts to a serious breach of our regulations, we are instructing the broadcaster to broadcast a statement of our determinations against it on BBC Two at 21:00, with a timing to be finalised," the statement read.
'Possibility to Undermine Trust'
The regulator's announcement declared: "Our probe determined that the programme's failure to disclose that the presenter's male guardian held a role in the Hamas-administered administration was materially misleading.
"Consequently that the public did not have essential details which may have been highly relevant to their judgment of the voice and the information he shared.
"Credibility is at the core of the bond between a television network and its audience, notably for a national broadcasting corporation such as the British Broadcasting Corporation.
"This error had the risk to damage the exceptionally strong amounts of confidence that viewers would have put in a factual film from the broadcaster about the conflict in Gaza."
The programme was pulled from iPlayer in last February after the boy's familial connections were revealed, and in July an broadcaster's internal assessment found it violated the broadcaster's journalistic standards on accuracy.
A representative for the broadcaster commented: "The Ofcom ruling is in accordance with the findings of the internal assessment, that there was a significant failing in the film in relation to the broadcaster's journalistic policies on accuracy, which reflects Rule 2.2 of the authority's broadcasting regulations.
"We expressed regret for this and we accept the authority's determination in full. We will comply with the sanction as soon as the date and wording are finalised."
