British Broadcasting Corporation Gaza Programme Deemed a 'Significant' Breach of Media Regulations, Declares UK Media Regulator
The BBC committed a "major breach" of broadcasting rules by not revealing that the voice of a programme about the Gaza conflict was the offspring of a Hamas representative, as determined by UK media regulator Ofcom.
An probe by Ofcom into the programme Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has determined that the documentary was "materially misleading".
The BBC's director general had earlier expressed regret, saying there had been "a significant failing in relation to factual correctness".
The regulator has directed the BBC to broadcast a peak-time announcement about its conclusions.
"Since this amounts to a major infringement of our regulations, we are ordering the BBC to air a announcement of our findings against it on the BBC's second channel at 9pm, with a schedule to be finalised," the regulator stated.
'Potential to Erode Trust'
The watchdog's announcement said: "The inquiry we conducted found that the documentary's omission to reveal that the presenter's parent occupied a role in the Hamas-run administration was significantly deceptive.
"Consequently that the audience did not have essential details which may have been very significant to their evaluation of the voice and the details he shared.
"Credibility is at the core of the relationship between a television network and its viewers, particularly for a state-funded media outlet such as the British Broadcasting Corporation.
"This error had the risk to erode the very considerable levels of trust that audiences would have invested in a factual film from the broadcaster about the Israel-Gaza war."
The documentary was pulled from the BBC's streaming service in last February after the boy's familial connections emerged, and in July an internal BBC review found it breached the corporation's content policies on truthfulness.
A BBC spokesperson commented: "The Ofcom ruling is in accordance with the results of the internal assessment, that there was a significant failing in the programme in relation to the BBC's Editorial Guidelines on accuracy, which aligns with regulation 2.2 of the regulator's media standards.
"We have apologised for this and we comply with Ofcom's decision in complete. We will follow the penalty as soon as the date and language are confirmed."
