BBC Gaza Film Ruled a 'Significant' Infringement of Broadcasting Rules, Declares Ofcom
The BBC engaged in a "serious breach" of industry standards by omitting to mention that the voice of a film about Gaza was the son of a Hamas administrator, as ruled by UK media regulator Ofcom.
An probe by the broadcasting watchdog into the documentary titled Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has determined that the documentary was "materially misleading".
The chief executive of the broadcaster had earlier expressed regret, stating there had been "a serious error in relation to accuracy".
The regulator has instructed the corporation to transmit a evening announcement about its findings.
"As this represents a major infringement of our code, we are instructing the corporation to air a announcement of our determinations against it on BBC Two at 21:00, with a date to be finalised," the regulator stated.
'Potential to Undermine Trust'
The regulator's announcement said: "The inquiry we conducted found that the documentary's failure to disclose that the voice's parent occupied a role in the Hamas-controlled administration was substantially inaccurate.
"This implied that the public did not have critical information which may have been extremely pertinent to their judgment of the voice and the details he shared.
"Credibility is at the core of the connection between a television network and its public, particularly for a public service broadcaster such as the public broadcaster.
"This error had the risk to damage the significantly high degrees of trust that audiences would have put in a documentary produced by the BBC about the Israel-Gaza war."
The film was withdrawn from iPlayer in the month of February after the narrator's personal associations were revealed, and in the month of July an corporation's own inquiry determined it violated the corporation's journalistic standards on truthfulness.
A BBC spokesperson commented: "The regulator's decision is in line with the conclusions of Peter Johnston's review, that there was a major oversight in the film in relation to the corporation's content standards on accuracy, which reflects Rule 2.2 of the authority's broadcasting regulations.
"We expressed regret for this and we accept Ofcom's decision in complete. We will follow the sanction as soon as the timing and wording are confirmed."
