British Broadcasting Corporation Gaza Documentary Considered a 'Serious' Infringement of Media Standards, Says UK Media Regulator
The public service broadcaster engaged in a "major breach" of industry standards by failing to disclose that the narrator of a film about the Gaza situation was the offspring of a Hamas administrator, as determined by regulatory body Ofcom.
An investigation by Ofcom into Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has found that the documentary was "materially misleading".
The chief executive of the broadcaster had already issued an apology, noting there had been "a serious error in relation to factual correctness".
Ofcom has instructed the BBC to broadcast a prime-time declaration about its decisions.
"Since this amounts to a serious breach of our regulations, we are directing the broadcaster to transmit a announcement of our conclusions against it on BBC Two at 9pm, with a date to be finalised," the statement read.
'Risk to Erode Confidence'
The watchdog's statement declared: "Our investigation determined that the programme's omission to reveal that the voice's parent occupied a role in the Hamas-run government was significantly deceptive.
"Consequently that the audience did not have essential details which may have been highly relevant to their assessment of the presenter and the details he presented.
"Confidence is at the core of the connection between a broadcaster and its viewers, notably for a state-funded media outlet such as the public broadcaster.
"This failing had the potential to erode the significantly high amounts of confidence that viewers would have put in a documentary produced by the BBC about the Gaza conflict."
The film was pulled from the online platform in the month of February after the narrator's family links were revealed, and in this past July an broadcaster's internal assessment concluded it breached the corporation's content policies on accuracy.
A BBC spokesperson said: "The regulator's decision is in agreement with the conclusions of Peter Johnston's review, that there was a major oversight in the documentary in relation to the BBC's Editorial Guidelines on accuracy, which aligns with clause 2.2 of Ofcom's Broadcasting Code.
"We have apologised for this and we comply with the authority's determination in complete. We will adhere to the penalty as soon as the timing and wording are determined."
