BBC Gaza Documentary Considered a 'Major' Breach of Broadcasting Rules, Says Broadcasting Watchdog
The British broadcaster committed a "serious breach" of media regulations by not revealing that the presenter of a programme about the Gaza situation was the child of a Hamas representative, as determined by UK media regulator Ofcom.
An probe by the broadcasting watchdog into the programme Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has found that the documentary was "significantly deceptive".
The chief executive of the broadcaster had already issued an apology, noting there had been "a serious error in relation to accuracy".
The authority has instructed the BBC to air a prime-time declaration about its conclusions.
"Given this constitutes a serious breach of our regulations, we are directing the BBC to broadcast a announcement of our conclusions against it on BBC2 at nine o'clock in the evening, with a date to be determined," it said.
'Potential to Erode Confidence'
The authority's report said: "The inquiry we conducted found that the film's lack of disclosure that the narrator's father served in a position in the Hamas-controlled government was materially misleading.
"Consequently that the public did not have essential details which may have been highly relevant to their evaluation of the presenter and the information he provided.
"Trust is at the core of the relationship between a media organization and its public, especially for a state-funded media outlet such as the BBC.
"This oversight had the possibility to damage the significantly high amounts of trust that the public would have placed in a documentary produced by the BBC about the Israel-Gaza war."
The film was withdrawn from the BBC's streaming service in the month of February after the presenter's personal associations came to light, and in July an broadcaster's internal assessment concluded it breached the broadcaster's editorial guidelines on truthfulness.
A corporation official stated: "The regulator's decision is in line with the findings of the corporation's inquiry, that there was a serious error in the film in relation to the BBC's Editorial Guidelines on factual correctness, which aligns with clause 2.2 of Ofcom's Broadcasting Code.
"We expressed regret for this and we agree with the regulator's ruling in complete. We will follow the penalty as soon as the timing and wording are confirmed."
