British Broadcasting Corporation Gaza Documentary Considered a 'Serious' Infringement of Broadcasting Rules, States UK Media Regulator
The BBC committed a "serious breach" of industry standards by omitting to mention that the narrator of a documentary about the Gaza conflict was the offspring of a Hamas administrator, as ruled by UK media regulator Ofcom.
An inquiry by the media regulator into the documentary titled Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has concluded 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 accuracy".
Ofcom has directed the broadcaster to air a prime-time statement about its decisions.
"As this represents a serious breach of our code, we are directing the corporation to air a statement of our findings against it on BBC2 at 9pm, with a date to be confirmed," it said.
'Potential to Undermine Credibility'
The watchdog's announcement declared: "The inquiry we conducted concluded that the programme's omission to reveal that the voice's parent held a post in the Hamas-controlled administration was substantially inaccurate.
"This implied that the audience did not have essential details which may have been extremely pertinent to their assessment of the presenter and the content he presented.
"Trust is at the heart of the connection between a media organization and its viewers, especially for a public service broadcaster such as the BBC.
"This oversight had the possibility to undermine the significantly high levels of confidence that the public would have put in a factual film from the broadcaster about the conflict in Gaza."
The film was pulled from iPlayer in the month of February after the presenter's family links were revealed, and in the month of July an internal BBC review determined it violated the broadcaster's content policies on truthfulness.
A BBC spokesperson stated: "The regulator's decision is in accordance with the conclusions of the corporation's inquiry, that there was a major oversight in the programme in relation to the broadcaster's journalistic policies on truthfulness, which corresponds to Rule 2.2 of the authority's broadcasting regulations.
"We expressed regret for this and we comply with the authority's determination in complete. We will follow the directive as soon as the timing and language are finalised."
