BBC Gaza Documentary Deemed a 'Serious' Breach of Media Standards, States Broadcasting Watchdog
The public service broadcaster engaged in a "major breach" of broadcasting rules by omitting to mention that the narrator of a programme about the Gaza conflict was the son of a Hamas representative, as determined by UK media regulator Ofcom.
An probe by the broadcasting watchdog into the documentary titled Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has determined that the documentary was "materially misleading".
The head of the BBC had earlier expressed regret, noting there had been "a serious error in relation to accuracy".
Ofcom has directed the BBC to transmit a peak-time declaration about its decisions.
"Given this constitutes a significant violation of our code, we are ordering the broadcaster to air a message of our findings against it on the BBC's second channel at 21:00, with a date to be confirmed," the regulator stated.
'Risk to Damage Trust'
The authority's statement said: "Our probe determined that the programme's omission to reveal that the narrator's parent served in a position in the Hamas-controlled administration was substantially inaccurate.
"It meant that the viewers did not have critical information which may have been very significant to their evaluation of the narrator and the content he provided.
"Confidence is at the center of the connection between a media organization and its viewers, particularly for a national broadcasting corporation such as the British Broadcasting Corporation.
"This error had the risk to damage the exceptionally strong degrees of trust that viewers would have invested in a factual film from the broadcaster about the Israel-Gaza war."
The film was withdrawn from iPlayer in the month of February after the boy's personal associations emerged, and in July an internal BBC review concluded it breached the broadcaster's editorial guidelines on factual correctness.
A representative for the broadcaster stated: "The authority's determination is in accordance with the findings of Peter Johnston's review, that there was a serious error in the documentary in relation to the BBC's Editorial Guidelines on accuracy, which corresponds to Rule 2.2 of the regulator's media standards.
"We issued an apology for this and we agree with the authority's determination in its entirety. We will comply with the directive as soon as the timing and language are finalised."
