BBC Gaza Programme Considered a 'Significant' Violation of Broadcasting Regulations, Says Broadcasting Watchdog
The public service broadcaster committed a "serious breach" of broadcasting rules by omitting to mention that the voice of a programme about the Gaza conflict was the offspring 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 determined that the documentary was "significantly deceptive".
The chief executive of the broadcaster had previously apologised, stating there had been "a significant failing in relation to accuracy".
The regulator has directed the corporation to air a prime-time announcement about its conclusions.
"As this represents a serious breach of our code, we are directing the BBC to transmit a announcement of our determinations against it on the BBC's second channel at 9pm, with a schedule to be determined," the regulator stated.
'Potential to Damage Trust'
The authority's statement declared: "The inquiry we conducted determined that the documentary's lack of disclosure that the voice's male guardian held a post in the Hamas-administered government was substantially inaccurate.
"It meant that the audience did not have critical information which may have been very significant to their judgment of the presenter and the content he presented.
"Trust is at the center of the connection between a television network and its public, notably for a state-funded media outlet such as the British Broadcasting Corporation.
"This failing had the risk to erode the very considerable degrees of confidence that audiences would have invested in a factual film from the broadcaster about the Israel-Gaza war."
The programme was withdrawn from the BBC's streaming service in last February after the boy's family links came to light, and in this past July an internal BBC review determined it breached the organization's journalistic standards on accuracy.
A corporation official said: "The authority's determination is in agreement with the conclusions of Peter Johnston's review, that there was a serious error in the programme in relation to the corporation's content standards on accuracy, which reflects Rule 2.2 of the regulator's media standards.
"We issued an apology for this and we comply with the regulator's ruling in complete. We will comply with the penalty as soon as the date and language are confirmed."
