BBC Gaza Documentary Considered a 'Major' Violation of Broadcasting Standards, States Ofcom
The BBC was found to have committed a "significant breach" of broadcasting rules by failing to disclose that the voice of a documentary about the Gaza conflict was the son of a Hamas representative, according to regulatory body Ofcom.
An inquiry by the media regulator into Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has determined that the programme was "substantially inaccurate".
The BBC's director general had already issued an apology, saying there had been "a major oversight in relation to accuracy".
Ofcom has ordered the broadcaster to broadcast a prime-time declaration about its decisions.
"Given this constitutes a significant violation of our code, we are directing the broadcaster to air a message of our determinations against it on BBC2 at nine o'clock in the evening, with a timing to be finalised," it said.
'Risk to Undermine Trust'
The regulator's statement declared: "Our probe found that the film's failure to disclose that the presenter's father held a role in the Hamas-run administration was substantially inaccurate.
"This implied that the viewers did not have vital facts which may have been extremely pertinent to their evaluation of the narrator and the content he provided.
"Credibility is at the core of the relationship between a media organization and its public, especially for a state-funded media outlet such as the BBC.
"This failing had the potential to damage the exceptionally strong degrees of trust that the public would have placed in a factual film from the broadcaster about the Israel-Gaza war."
The programme was withdrawn from the BBC's streaming service in last February after the narrator's familial connections emerged, and in the month of July an corporation's own inquiry concluded it infringed the broadcaster's journalistic standards on accuracy.
A representative for the broadcaster stated: "The Ofcom ruling is in accordance with the results of the corporation's inquiry, that there was a significant failing in the film in relation to the corporation's content standards on accuracy, which aligns with regulation 2.2 of Ofcom's Broadcasting Code.
"We have apologised for this and we agree with the authority's determination in complete. We will adhere to the penalty as soon as the timing and language are determined."
