BBC Gaza Programme Considered a 'Major' Infringement of Media Standards, Declares UK Media Regulator
The British broadcaster engaged in a "serious breach" of broadcasting rules by failing to disclose that the narrator of a documentary about the Gaza situation was the son of a Hamas representative, as determined by British broadcasting authority Ofcom.
An inquiry by the media regulator into Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has found that the film was "substantially inaccurate".
The chief executive of the broadcaster had earlier expressed regret, saying there had been "a serious error in relation to truthfulness".
The authority has ordered the corporation to air a prime-time declaration about its findings.
"Since this amounts to a serious breach of our rules, we are ordering the broadcaster to transmit a message of our conclusions against it on BBC Two at 9pm, with a schedule to be determined," it said.
'Possibility to Undermine Credibility'
The watchdog's statement said: "Our probe found that the documentary's failure to disclose that the presenter's parent held a post in the Hamas-administered administration was significantly deceptive.
"Consequently that the audience did not have critical information which may have been extremely pertinent to their judgment of the presenter and the content he provided.
"Credibility is at the center of the bond between a broadcaster and its public, notably for a national broadcasting corporation such as the BBC.
"This failing had the risk to damage the very considerable levels of trust that the public would have placed in a documentary produced by the BBC about the Gaza conflict."
The documentary was pulled from iPlayer in the month of February after the narrator's familial connections emerged, and in this past July an broadcaster's internal assessment found it infringed the broadcaster's content policies on factual correctness.
A representative for the broadcaster stated: "The Ofcom ruling is in line with the conclusions of Peter Johnston's review, that there was a serious error in the film in relation to the broadcaster's journalistic policies on truthfulness, which aligns with clause 2.2 of the authority's broadcasting regulations.
"We expressed regret for this and we agree with Ofcom's decision in complete. We will adhere to the sanction as soon as the schedule and wording are determined."
