BBC Gaza Programme Deemed a 'Significant' Breach of Broadcasting Standards, States UK Media Regulator
The British broadcaster committed a "major breach" of media regulations by not revealing that the presenter of a film about the Gaza situation was the child of a Hamas administrator, according to UK media regulator Ofcom.
An investigation by the media regulator into the documentary titled Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has found that the documentary was "materially misleading".
The BBC's director general had previously apologised, noting there had been "a serious error in relation to accuracy".
The authority has instructed the broadcaster to transmit a evening declaration about its decisions.
"As this represents a major infringement of our code, we are ordering the BBC to broadcast a statement of our conclusions against it on BBC Two at nine o'clock in the evening, with a schedule to be confirmed," the regulator stated.
'Potential to Damage Trust'
The authority's report said: "Our investigation found that the documentary's failure to disclose that the narrator's parent occupied a post in the Hamas-controlled administration was materially misleading.
"It meant that the audience did not have essential details which may have been highly relevant to their judgment of the voice and the details he presented.
"Trust is at the center of the connection between a television network and its public, particularly for a public service broadcaster such as the BBC.
"This error had the possibility to erode the very considerable degrees of confidence that the public would have placed in a BBC factual programme about the Israel-Gaza war."
The documentary was removed from iPlayer in the month of February after the presenter's familial connections emerged, and in July an broadcaster's internal assessment concluded it infringed the corporation's editorial guidelines on factual correctness.
A representative for the broadcaster said: "The regulator's decision is in agreement with the findings of Peter Johnston's review, that there was a major oversight in the programme in relation to the corporation's content standards on factual correctness, which corresponds to clause 2.2 of the regulator's media standards.
"We expressed regret for this and we accept Ofcom's decision in complete. We will follow the sanction as soon as the schedule and wording are confirmed."
