BBC Gaza Documentary Considered a 'Significant' Breach of Broadcasting Regulations, Declares Broadcasting Watchdog
The public service broadcaster engaged in a "serious breach" of media regulations by failing to disclose that the voice of a programme about the Gaza conflict was the child of a Hamas official, according to UK media regulator Ofcom.
An investigation by the broadcasting watchdog into the documentary titled Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has found that the documentary was "materially misleading".
The head of the BBC had already issued an apology, stating there had been "a major oversight in relation to truthfulness".
Ofcom has directed the broadcaster to air a evening statement about its decisions.
"Given this constitutes a serious breach of our code, we are instructing the corporation to air a statement of our conclusions against it on BBC2 at nine o'clock in the evening, with a schedule to be confirmed," it said.
'Risk to Erode Trust'
The regulator's report stated: "The inquiry we conducted found that the documentary's lack of disclosure that the voice's male guardian occupied a post in the Hamas-run government was materially misleading.
"This implied that the audience did not have essential details which may have been very significant to their judgment of the presenter and the details he presented.
"Credibility is at the core of the connection between a broadcaster and its audience, particularly for a state-funded media outlet such as the public broadcaster.
"This oversight had the potential to undermine the very considerable amounts of credibility that the public would have placed in a BBC factual programme about the Israel-Gaza war."
The documentary was pulled from the BBC's streaming service in the month of February after the boy's familial connections emerged, and in July an internal BBC review determined it violated the corporation's journalistic standards on accuracy.
A representative for the broadcaster said: "The regulator's decision is in accordance with the findings of the corporation's inquiry, that there was a serious error in the programme in relation to the broadcaster's journalistic policies on accuracy, which reflects regulation 2.2 of the authority's broadcasting regulations.
"We have apologised for this and we comply with the authority's determination in its entirety. We will comply with the sanction as soon as the date and language are confirmed."
