BBC Gaza Documentary Ruled a 'Major' Breach of Media Regulations, States Broadcasting Watchdog
The BBC was found to have committed a "major breach" of industry standards by failing to disclose that the voice of a documentary about the Gaza situation was the child of a Hamas official, according to British broadcasting authority Ofcom.
An probe by Ofcom into the programme Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has determined that the film was "materially misleading".
The chief executive of the broadcaster had earlier expressed regret, stating there had been "a major oversight in relation to factual correctness".
The regulator has instructed the corporation to broadcast a evening announcement about its decisions.
"As this represents a significant violation of our rules, we are ordering the broadcaster to broadcast a message of our conclusions against it on the BBC's second channel at 21:00, with a date to be finalised," the statement read.
'Possibility to Erode Confidence'
The authority's statement said: "Our probe determined that the film's failure to disclose that the narrator's male guardian held a post in the Hamas-administered government was significantly deceptive.
"This implied that the viewers did not have critical information which may have been highly relevant to their evaluation of the voice and the details he presented.
"Confidence is at the center of the connection between a television network and its audience, notably for a state-funded media outlet such as the British Broadcasting Corporation.
"This error had the risk to damage the significantly high degrees of trust that the public would have put in a factual film from the broadcaster about the conflict in Gaza."
The documentary was removed from the BBC's streaming service in last February after the narrator's familial connections were revealed, and in July an internal BBC review concluded it violated the corporation's content policies on factual correctness.
A corporation official commented: "The regulator's decision is in accordance with the findings of the corporation's inquiry, that there was a serious error in the documentary in relation to the broadcaster's journalistic policies on truthfulness, which aligns with Rule 2.2 of the regulator's media standards.
"We expressed regret for this and we agree with the regulator's ruling in full. We will follow the penalty as soon as the timing and language are determined."
