BBC Gaza Programme Deemed a 'Serious' Infringement of Media Standards, Says Broadcasting Watchdog
The BBC was found to have committed a "major breach" of industry standards by omitting to mention that the narrator of a film about the Gaza situation was the son of a Hamas official, as determined by regulatory body Ofcom.
An investigation by Ofcom into the documentary titled Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has concluded that the documentary was "materially misleading".
The head of the BBC had previously apologised, saying there had been "a serious error in relation to accuracy".
The authority has instructed the BBC to transmit a peak-time statement about its findings.
"Since this amounts to a significant violation of our regulations, we are ordering the BBC to air a statement of our determinations against it on BBC Two at 21:00, with a schedule to be determined," the statement read.
'Potential to Damage Credibility'
The regulator's announcement stated: "Our investigation found that the film's failure to disclose that the narrator's father served in a post in the Hamas-administered authority was substantially inaccurate.
"This implied that the public did not have vital facts which may have been extremely pertinent to their evaluation of the narrator and the details he provided.
"Trust is at the center of the relationship between a television network and its audience, particularly for a public service broadcaster such as the British Broadcasting Corporation.
"This failing had the risk to undermine the exceptionally strong amounts of credibility that the public would have invested in a BBC factual programme about the Israel-Gaza war."
The film was withdrawn from iPlayer in February after the presenter's family links were revealed, and in July an corporation's own inquiry determined it breached the organization's content policies on accuracy.
A corporation official stated: "The regulator's decision is in line with the findings of the corporation's inquiry, that there was a major oversight in the programme in relation to the corporation's content standards on truthfulness, which corresponds to clause 2.2 of the regulator's media standards.
"We have apologised for this and we agree with the authority's determination in full. We will adhere to the sanction as soon as the schedule and wording are finalised."
