BBC Gaza Documentary Ruled a 'Significant' Infringement of Broadcasting Rules, Says UK Media Regulator
The public service broadcaster committed a "significant breach" of industry standards by omitting to mention that the voice of a programme about the Gaza situation was the son of a Hamas administrator, as determined by UK media regulator Ofcom.
An probe by the broadcasting watchdog into the documentary titled Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has found that the documentary was "materially misleading".
The chief executive of the broadcaster had previously apologised, saying there had been "a significant failing in relation to factual correctness".
The regulator has directed the BBC to broadcast a peak-time statement about its decisions.
"Given this constitutes a serious breach of our rules, we are directing the broadcaster to transmit a statement of our conclusions against it on BBC Two at nine o'clock in the evening, with a date to be determined," it said.
'Possibility to Undermine Confidence'
The regulator's announcement said: "Our probe found that the film's failure to disclose that the presenter's male guardian occupied a post in the Hamas-run administration was significantly deceptive.
"It meant that the public did not have critical information which may have been highly relevant to their judgment of the presenter and the details he presented.
"Trust is at the core of the connection between a media organization and its viewers, especially for a national broadcasting corporation such as the BBC.
"This oversight had the potential to undermine the exceptionally strong degrees of trust that the public would have put in a documentary produced by the BBC about the Gaza conflict."
The documentary was removed from the online platform in the month of February after the boy's familial connections were revealed, and in this past July an broadcaster's internal assessment determined it violated the corporation's editorial guidelines on truthfulness.
A corporation official stated: "The authority's determination is in agreement with the findings of the corporation's inquiry, that there was a significant failing in the film in relation to the broadcaster's journalistic policies on factual correctness, which reflects clause 2.2 of the authority's broadcasting regulations.
"We issued an apology for this and we accept the regulator's ruling in full. We will comply with the penalty as soon as the date and language are determined."
