British Broadcasting Corporation Gaza Film Deemed a 'Significant' Infringement of Media Regulations, Declares UK Media Regulator
The British broadcaster was found to have committed a "significant breach" of industry standards by not revealing that the voice of a film about Gaza was the son of a Hamas representative, as ruled by regulatory body Ofcom.
An inquiry by the broadcasting watchdog into the programme Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has determined that the programme was "substantially inaccurate".
The BBC's director general had previously apologised, stating there had been "a significant failing in relation to accuracy".
The authority has instructed the BBC to air a evening declaration about its findings.
"As this represents a serious breach of our rules, we are instructing the corporation to transmit a announcement of our findings against it on the BBC's second channel at nine o'clock in the evening, with a schedule to be confirmed," the statement read.
'Potential to Undermine Confidence'
The authority's statement said: "Our probe found that the film's failure to disclose that the voice's parent occupied a post in the Hamas-controlled government was materially misleading.
"It meant that the public did not have vital facts which may have been extremely pertinent to their evaluation of the narrator and the content he provided.
"Trust is at the heart of the bond between a television network and its viewers, especially for a public service broadcaster such as the public broadcaster.
"This failing had the potential to erode the exceptionally strong levels of confidence that viewers would have invested in a factual film from the broadcaster about the Israel-Gaza war."
The documentary was withdrawn from iPlayer in February after the narrator's familial connections were revealed, and in this past July an internal BBC review found it violated the organization's editorial guidelines on truthfulness.
A corporation official commented: "The Ofcom ruling is in line with the conclusions of the internal assessment, that there was a significant failing in the documentary in relation to the corporation's content standards on accuracy, which corresponds to clause 2.2 of the regulator's media standards.
"We issued an apology for this and we agree with the authority's determination in complete. We will follow the directive as soon as the timing and wording are determined."
