BBC Gaza Documentary Ruled a 'Serious' Breach of Broadcasting Standards, Says Broadcasting Watchdog
The British broadcaster was found to have committed a "serious breach" of broadcasting rules by failing to disclose that the voice of a film about the Gaza conflict was the son of a Hamas representative, as ruled by British broadcasting authority Ofcom.
An inquiry by the broadcasting watchdog into the documentary titled Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has found that the film was "significantly deceptive".
The BBC's director general had earlier expressed regret, saying there had been "a serious error in relation to factual correctness".
Ofcom has instructed the BBC to broadcast a evening declaration about its findings.
"As this represents a serious breach of our code, we are directing the BBC to air a statement of our determinations against it on the BBC's second channel at nine o'clock in the evening, with a schedule to be finalised," the regulator stated.
'Potential to Damage Credibility'
The watchdog's report said: "Our probe determined that the film's omission to reveal that the voice's father occupied a post in the Hamas-controlled administration was materially misleading.
"Consequently that the public did not have essential details which may have been highly relevant to their assessment of the presenter and the information he presented.
"Confidence is at the center of the bond between a media organization and its viewers, notably for a national broadcasting corporation such as the British Broadcasting Corporation.
"This error had the potential to erode the exceptionally strong levels of confidence that audiences would have placed in a documentary produced by the BBC about the Gaza conflict."
The documentary was removed from iPlayer in the month of February after the narrator's familial connections came to light, and in July an internal BBC review concluded it violated the broadcaster's content policies on factual correctness.
A representative for the broadcaster said: "The regulator's decision is in line with the findings of the internal assessment, that there was a major oversight in the documentary in relation to the broadcaster's journalistic policies on truthfulness, which corresponds to regulation 2.2 of the regulator's media standards.
"We expressed regret for this and we accept the authority's determination in full. We will follow the sanction as soon as the schedule and wording are determined."
