BBC Gaza Programme Ruled a 'Major' Violation of Media Standards, States UK Media Regulator
The British broadcaster committed a "significant breach" of broadcasting rules by omitting to mention that the voice of a film about Gaza was the child of a Hamas official, as determined by British broadcasting authority Ofcom.
An investigation by the media regulator into the documentary titled Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has determined that the film was "significantly deceptive".
The chief executive of the broadcaster had earlier expressed regret, noting there had been "a significant failing in relation to accuracy".
The authority has ordered the BBC to broadcast a peak-time statement about its conclusions.
"As this represents a significant violation of our rules, we are ordering the BBC to broadcast a announcement of our determinations against it on BBC2 at 9pm, with a timing to be confirmed," the statement read.
'Possibility to Erode Confidence'
The authority's report said: "Our probe concluded that the documentary's lack of disclosure that the narrator's parent served in a post in the Hamas-run authority was significantly deceptive.
"It meant that the public did not have critical information which may have been highly relevant to their assessment of the voice and the details he provided.
"Confidence is at the heart of the relationship between a broadcaster and its audience, notably for a national broadcasting corporation such as the BBC.
"This oversight had the risk to undermine the significantly high degrees of confidence that audiences would have put in a factual film from the broadcaster about the Gaza conflict."
The programme was pulled from the BBC's streaming service in last February after the narrator's personal associations came to light, and in July an broadcaster's internal assessment found it infringed the corporation's journalistic standards on accuracy.
A BBC spokesperson stated: "The regulator's decision is in accordance with the findings of the internal assessment, that there was a serious error in the film in relation to the corporation's content standards on factual correctness, which corresponds to 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 directive as soon as the timing and wording are determined."
