British Broadcasting Corporation Gaza Documentary Deemed a 'Major' Infringement of Broadcasting Regulations, Says UK Media Regulator
The BBC was found to have committed a "serious breach" of broadcasting rules by failing to disclose that the voice of a film about the Gaza situation was the son of a Hamas official, as ruled by UK media regulator Ofcom.
An investigation by the media regulator into Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has found that the documentary was "materially misleading".
The head of the BBC had previously apologised, stating there had been "a serious error in relation to accuracy".
The regulator has instructed the BBC to broadcast a prime-time announcement about its findings.
"Since this amounts to a major infringement of our rules, we are ordering the corporation to broadcast a announcement of our determinations against it on BBC2 at 21:00, with a date to be finalised," the regulator stated.
'Risk to Undermine Credibility'
The watchdog's report said: "The inquiry we conducted found that the documentary's lack of disclosure that the presenter's parent held a role in the Hamas-controlled government was significantly deceptive.
"Consequently that the viewers did not have vital facts which may have been extremely pertinent to their assessment of the presenter and the details he provided.
"Confidence is at the heart of the relationship between a broadcaster and its viewers, particularly for a public service broadcaster such as the British Broadcasting Corporation.
"This oversight had the risk to undermine the exceptionally strong amounts of trust that audiences would have put in a factual film from the broadcaster about the Gaza conflict."
The documentary was withdrawn from the BBC's streaming service in last February after the presenter's familial connections came to light, and in the month of July an corporation's own inquiry found it infringed the organization's journalistic standards on factual correctness.
A corporation official said: "The Ofcom ruling is in agreement with the findings of the corporation's inquiry, that there was a major oversight in the film in relation to the BBC's Editorial Guidelines on accuracy, which corresponds to Rule 2.2 of the authority's broadcasting regulations.
"We issued an apology for this and we accept the regulator's ruling in its entirety. We will comply with the directive as soon as the schedule and wording are finalised."