British Broadcasting Corporation Gaza Programme Ruled a 'Significant' Breach of Media Rules, Declares UK Media Regulator
The public service broadcaster committed a "major breach" of media regulations by not revealing that the narrator of a film about Gaza was the son of a Hamas official, as ruled by regulatory body Ofcom.
An probe by the broadcasting watchdog into the programme Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has found that the programme was "substantially inaccurate".
The chief executive of the broadcaster had previously apologised, stating there had been "a major oversight in relation to accuracy".
The authority has directed the corporation to transmit a peak-time statement about its decisions.
"As this represents a serious breach of our code, we are directing the broadcaster to transmit a announcement of our findings against it on BBC2 at 21:00, with a timing to be determined," the regulator stated.
'Risk to Damage Credibility'
The watchdog's report said: "Our investigation determined that the film's omission to reveal that the narrator's male guardian occupied a role in the Hamas-controlled administration was significantly deceptive.
"Consequently that the public did not have critical information which may have been very significant to their evaluation of the presenter and the content he presented.
"Confidence is at the center of the bond between a media organization and its public, notably for a public service broadcaster such as the BBC.
"This failing had the risk to erode the exceptionally strong degrees of trust that the public would have invested in a factual film from the broadcaster about the Gaza conflict."
The documentary was pulled from iPlayer in last February after the boy's personal associations emerged, and in July an internal BBC review determined it breached the broadcaster's editorial guidelines on accuracy.
A BBC spokesperson said: "The regulator's decision is in agreement with the conclusions of Peter Johnston's review, that there was a significant failing in the documentary in relation to the broadcaster's journalistic policies on factual correctness, which reflects regulation 2.2 of Ofcom's Broadcasting Code.
"We expressed regret for this and we agree with the regulator's ruling in complete. We will adhere to the directive as soon as the date and language are finalised."
