BBC Gaza Documentary Considered a 'Serious' Infringement of Media Regulations, Declares Broadcasting Watchdog
The BBC was found to have committed a "major breach" of industry standards by failing to disclose that the voice of a film about the Gaza conflict was the son of a Hamas representative, as determined by British broadcasting authority Ofcom.
An investigation by the media regulator into the programme Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has concluded that the documentary was "materially misleading".
The BBC's director general had earlier expressed regret, stating there had been "a significant failing in relation to factual correctness".
Ofcom has instructed the BBC to air a evening announcement about its conclusions.
"As this represents a serious breach of our regulations, we are directing the BBC to air a statement of our findings against it on the BBC's second channel at nine o'clock in the evening, with a date to be finalised," the regulator stated.
'Potential to Erode Trust'
The watchdog's statement said: "Our investigation determined that the programme's lack of disclosure that the narrator's male guardian held a role in the Hamas-run administration was materially misleading.
"Consequently that the public did not have vital facts which may have been extremely pertinent to their evaluation of the voice and the details he provided.
"Trust is at the core of the bond between a media organization and its viewers, especially for a state-funded media outlet such as the BBC.
"This error had the risk to damage the very considerable degrees of credibility that viewers would have placed in a BBC factual programme about the Israel-Gaza war."
The film was withdrawn from iPlayer in last February after the boy's familial connections emerged, and in this past July an broadcaster's internal assessment concluded it infringed the broadcaster's content policies on factual correctness.
A representative for the broadcaster commented: "The Ofcom ruling is in line with the findings of Peter Johnston's review, that there was a serious error in the programme in relation to the BBC's Editorial Guidelines on truthfulness, which reflects regulation 2.2 of the regulator's media standards.
"We expressed regret for this and we agree with Ofcom's decision in full. We will follow the penalty as soon as the timing and wording are determined."
