British Broadcasting Corporation Gaza Documentary Considered a 'Serious' Infringement of Media Standards, States Ofcom
The BBC engaged in a "serious breach" of industry standards by not revealing that the narrator of a film about Gaza was the child of a Hamas official, as determined by UK media regulator Ofcom.
An investigation by the media regulator into Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has found that the documentary was "materially misleading".
The head of the BBC had already issued an apology, saying there had been "a major oversight in relation to accuracy".
Ofcom has instructed the BBC to broadcast a peak-time statement about its conclusions.
"As this represents a significant violation of our rules, we are instructing the corporation to transmit a announcement of our conclusions against it on BBC Two at nine o'clock in the evening, with a timing to be determined," it said.
'Potential to Erode Credibility'
The authority's report declared: "Our probe found that the programme's omission to reveal that the presenter's male guardian occupied a position in the Hamas-administered authority was materially misleading.
"Consequently that the audience did not have critical information which may have been highly relevant to their evaluation of the presenter and the details he presented.
"Trust is at the center of the connection between a television network and its public, notably for a public service broadcaster such as the British Broadcasting Corporation.
"This failing had the risk to undermine the significantly high amounts of confidence that viewers would have placed in a factual film from the broadcaster about the conflict in Gaza."
The film was pulled from the BBC's streaming service in last February after the boy's personal associations came to light, and in July an broadcaster's internal assessment found it infringed the broadcaster's journalistic standards on accuracy.
A corporation official said: "The Ofcom ruling is in accordance with the findings of the internal assessment, that there was a serious error in the documentary in relation to the BBC's Editorial Guidelines on truthfulness, which corresponds to clause 2.2 of the authority's broadcasting regulations.
"We have apologised for this and we agree with Ofcom's decision in its entirety. We will comply with the sanction as soon as the timing and wording are confirmed."
