BBC Gaza Documentary Deemed a 'Significant' Infringement of Media Regulations, Declares Ofcom
The British broadcaster was found to have committed a "serious breach" of industry standards by not revealing that the voice of a programme about Gaza was the son of a Hamas representative, according to UK media regulator Ofcom.
An probe by the broadcasting watchdog into the programme Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has found that the film was "materially misleading".
The BBC's director general had previously apologised, stating there had been "a serious error in relation to factual correctness".
The regulator has instructed the broadcaster to broadcast a peak-time statement about its findings.
"Since this amounts to a significant violation of our code, we are directing the corporation to air a message of our conclusions against it on BBC Two at 21:00, with a date to be determined," it said.
'Risk to Undermine Confidence'
The regulator's statement said: "The inquiry we conducted concluded that the documentary's failure to disclose that the voice's father served in a position in the Hamas-administered authority was significantly deceptive.
"It meant that the public did not have critical information which may have been extremely pertinent to their evaluation of the narrator and the information he presented.
"Credibility is at the heart of the bond between a broadcaster and its audience, notably for a public service broadcaster such as the public broadcaster.
"This error had the potential to erode the significantly high degrees of trust that viewers would have invested in a BBC factual programme about the Israel-Gaza war."
The film was withdrawn from the online platform in the month of February after the boy's family links came to light, and in the month of July an broadcaster's internal assessment found it infringed the organization's journalistic standards on accuracy.
A corporation official commented: "The authority's determination is in accordance with the findings of the corporation's inquiry, that there was a major oversight in the programme in relation to the BBC's Editorial Guidelines on accuracy, which aligns with clause 2.2 of Ofcom's Broadcasting Code.
"We expressed regret for this and we accept the regulator's ruling in its entirety. We will adhere to the directive as soon as the schedule and wording are determined."