BBC Gaza Film Deemed a 'Major' Violation of Media Regulations, Says Ofcom
The British broadcaster committed a "serious breach" of industry standards by failing to disclose that the voice of a film about the Gaza situation was the son of a Hamas administrator, according to UK media regulator Ofcom.
An investigation by Ofcom into the programme Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has found that the film was "materially misleading".
The head of the BBC had already issued an apology, stating there had been "a significant failing in relation to factual correctness".
The authority has ordered the corporation to transmit a peak-time statement about its conclusions.
"As this represents a major infringement of our regulations, we are ordering the broadcaster to air a statement of our conclusions against it on BBC2 at nine o'clock in the evening, with a date to be finalised," the regulator stated.
'Risk to Erode Credibility'
The authority's statement stated: "The inquiry we conducted concluded that the programme's failure to disclose that the narrator's parent occupied a role in the Hamas-controlled authority was substantially inaccurate.
"Consequently that the public did not have critical information which may have been extremely pertinent to their assessment of the presenter and the details he provided.
"Credibility is at the heart of the connection between a broadcaster and its viewers, notably for a national broadcasting corporation such as the public broadcaster.
"This oversight had the potential to undermine the significantly high degrees of credibility that viewers would have invested in a documentary produced by the BBC about the conflict in Gaza."
The film was withdrawn from the online platform in last February after the narrator's familial connections came to light, and in the month of July an broadcaster's internal assessment determined it violated the broadcaster's editorial guidelines on truthfulness.
A corporation official said: "The authority's determination is in line with the findings of Peter Johnston's review, that there was a serious error in the programme in relation to the corporation's content standards on accuracy, which corresponds to clause 2.2 of Ofcom's Broadcasting Code.
"We issued an apology for this and we agree with the authority's determination in its entirety. We will adhere to the penalty as soon as the schedule and wording are determined."
