BBC Gaza Programme Considered a 'Major' Infringement of Broadcasting Regulations, Says UK Media Regulator
The British broadcaster engaged in a "serious breach" of broadcasting rules by failing to disclose that the voice of a programme about Gaza was the child of a Hamas administrator, as ruled by British broadcasting authority Ofcom.
An inquiry by the broadcasting watchdog into the documentary titled Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has determined that the programme was "substantially inaccurate".
The chief executive of the broadcaster had earlier expressed regret, noting there had been "a major oversight in relation to factual correctness".
Ofcom has directed the BBC to air a prime-time announcement about its conclusions.
"As this represents a serious breach of our rules, we are instructing the broadcaster to broadcast a statement of our determinations against it on the BBC's second channel at 9pm, with a timing to be confirmed," the statement read.
'Risk to Undermine Credibility'
The watchdog's announcement said: "Our investigation found that the film's lack of disclosure that the narrator's parent served in a post in the Hamas-administered government was significantly deceptive.
"Consequently that the viewers did not have critical information which may have been very significant to their evaluation of the narrator and the information he provided.
"Confidence is at the core of the bond between a media organization and its viewers, notably for a public service broadcaster such as the BBC.
"This oversight had the risk to undermine the exceptionally strong levels of trust that viewers would have invested in a documentary produced by the BBC about the conflict in Gaza."
The programme was removed from the online platform in February after the boy's familial connections were revealed, and in July an internal BBC review found it violated the organization's editorial guidelines on truthfulness.
A BBC spokesperson stated: "The Ofcom ruling is in accordance with the conclusions of the corporation's inquiry, that there was a major oversight in the documentary in relation to the BBC's Editorial Guidelines on factual correctness, which corresponds to Rule 2.2 of the authority's broadcasting regulations.
"We have apologised for this and we accept Ofcom's decision in complete. We will follow the penalty as soon as the timing and language are finalised."
