BBC Gaza Documentary Deemed a 'Major' Violation of Media Standards, Declares Ofcom
The British broadcaster engaged in a "major breach" of industry standards by failing to disclose that the voice of a film about the Gaza situation was the child of a Hamas administrator, according to UK media regulator Ofcom.
An inquiry by the media regulator into the programme Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has concluded that the film was "materially misleading".
The head of the BBC had previously apologised, noting there had been "a major oversight in relation to accuracy".
The regulator has directed the corporation to air a peak-time statement about its decisions.
"As this represents a significant violation of our rules, we are ordering the broadcaster to transmit a message of our conclusions against it on the BBC's second channel at 21:00, with a schedule to be confirmed," it said.
'Possibility to Damage Confidence'
The regulator's report stated: "Our investigation concluded that the programme's lack of disclosure that the voice's parent occupied a role in the Hamas-controlled administration was substantially inaccurate.
"This implied that the audience did not have essential details which may have been extremely pertinent to their assessment of the presenter and the information he provided.
"Confidence is at the heart of the connection between a media organization and its audience, particularly for a public service broadcaster such as the public broadcaster.
"This failing had the potential to damage the exceptionally strong amounts of credibility that viewers would have placed in a BBC factual programme about the Gaza conflict."
The film was withdrawn from the online platform in February after the presenter's personal associations were revealed, and in this past July an internal BBC review found it violated the corporation's content policies on truthfulness.
A representative for the broadcaster stated: "The Ofcom ruling is in accordance with the conclusions of the corporation's inquiry, that there was a significant failing in the film in relation to the BBC's Editorial Guidelines on truthfulness, which aligns with regulation 2.2 of the regulator's media standards.
"We expressed regret for this and we comply with Ofcom's decision in complete. We will follow the penalty as soon as the schedule and wording are determined."
