British Broadcasting Corporation Gaza Film Deemed a 'Serious' Breach of Media Rules, States Broadcasting Watchdog
The BBC engaged in a "major breach" of media regulations by omitting to mention that the presenter of a documentary about the Gaza situation was the son of a Hamas official, as ruled by UK media regulator Ofcom.
An inquiry by the broadcasting watchdog into the documentary titled Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has determined that the film was "materially misleading".
The BBC's director general had already issued an apology, noting there had been "a major oversight in relation to truthfulness".
Ofcom has directed the BBC to broadcast a peak-time statement about its findings.
"Since this amounts to a serious breach of our code, we are directing the BBC to transmit a message of our findings against it on BBC Two at nine o'clock in the evening, with a date to be confirmed," the statement read.
'Potential to Undermine Confidence'
The watchdog's report stated: "Our investigation concluded that the film's omission to reveal that the voice's male guardian served in a position in the Hamas-controlled administration was materially misleading.
"Consequently that the viewers did not have vital facts which may have been highly relevant to their judgment of the narrator and the details he shared.
"Trust is at the core of the connection between a television network and its viewers, notably for a state-funded media outlet such as the BBC.
"This failing had the potential to undermine the significantly high amounts of confidence that audiences would have invested in a factual film from the broadcaster about the Gaza conflict."
The programme was removed from the online platform in last February after the narrator's family links emerged, and in this past July an internal BBC review concluded it infringed the organization's journalistic standards on accuracy.
A corporation official commented: "The Ofcom ruling is in line with the findings of Peter Johnston's review, that there was a significant failing in the programme in relation to the BBC's Editorial Guidelines on truthfulness, which corresponds to regulation 2.2 of Ofcom's Broadcasting Code.
"We issued an apology for this and we comply with the regulator's ruling in full. We will follow the penalty as soon as the timing and wording are confirmed."
