BBC Gaza Programme Ruled a 'Major' Infringement of Media Standards, Declares Ofcom
The BBC engaged in a "serious breach" of industry standards by failing to disclose that the narrator of a documentary about Gaza was the offspring of a Hamas representative, as determined by UK media regulator Ofcom.
An inquiry by the media regulator into the programme Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has found that the film was "substantially inaccurate".
The BBC's director general had already issued an apology, noting there had been "a serious error in relation to factual correctness".
The authority has directed the corporation to air a peak-time statement about its decisions.
"As this represents a major infringement of our rules, we are instructing the BBC to air a announcement of our findings against it on BBC2 at nine o'clock in the evening, with a schedule to be determined," it said.
'Potential to Erode Confidence'
The authority's report stated: "Our probe determined that the documentary's failure to disclose that the presenter's father held a position in the Hamas-controlled administration was materially misleading.
"This implied that the audience did not have critical information which may have been extremely pertinent to their assessment of the presenter and the information he provided.
"Credibility is at the core of the bond between a broadcaster and its viewers, particularly for a national broadcasting corporation such as the public broadcaster.
"This error had the risk to erode the significantly high levels of confidence that the public would have placed in a factual film from the broadcaster about the conflict in Gaza."
The programme was removed from iPlayer in February after the boy's familial connections emerged, and in July an corporation's own inquiry found it infringed the broadcaster's content policies on factual correctness.
A representative for the broadcaster stated: "The regulator's decision is in agreement with the conclusions of the corporation's inquiry, that there was a serious error in the film in relation to the broadcaster's journalistic policies on truthfulness, which aligns with Rule 2.2 of Ofcom's Broadcasting Code.
"We have apologised for this and we comply with the authority's determination in full. We will follow the penalty as soon as the timing and wording are determined."
