British Broadcasting Corporation Gaza Film Ruled a 'Serious' Breach of Media Rules, Says Broadcasting Watchdog
The British broadcaster was found to have committed a "serious breach" of broadcasting rules by not revealing that the narrator of a programme about the Gaza situation was the child of a Hamas official, as determined by regulatory body Ofcom.
An inquiry by the broadcasting watchdog into Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has determined that the documentary was "materially misleading".
The head of the BBC had earlier expressed regret, stating there had been "a significant failing in relation to factual correctness".
The authority has instructed the corporation to transmit a evening announcement about its conclusions.
"As this represents a significant violation of our code, we are directing the corporation to air a announcement of our findings against it on the BBC's second channel at 9pm, with a schedule to be finalised," it said.
'Risk to Damage Trust'
The regulator's statement said: "The inquiry we conducted found that the documentary's omission to reveal that the narrator's male guardian held a post in the Hamas-controlled government was significantly deceptive.
"Consequently that the viewers did not have essential details which may have been highly relevant to their evaluation of the voice and the content he presented.
"Confidence is at the center of the relationship between a media organization and its audience, particularly for a state-funded media outlet such as the BBC.
"This oversight had the risk to undermine the very considerable amounts of trust that viewers would have invested in a BBC factual programme about the Gaza conflict."
The film was removed from iPlayer in February after the boy's familial connections were revealed, and in July an broadcaster's internal assessment found it breached the broadcaster's journalistic standards on factual correctness.
A BBC spokesperson said: "The authority's determination is in agreement with the conclusions of the internal assessment, that there was a serious error in the documentary in relation to the BBC's Editorial Guidelines on accuracy, which aligns with clause 2.2 of the regulator's media standards.
"We issued an apology for this and we comply with the authority's determination in its entirety. We will comply with the sanction as soon as the timing and language are confirmed."
