British Broadcasting Corporation Gaza Programme Considered a 'Major' Breach of Media Regulations, Says Ofcom
The BBC was found to have committed a "major breach" of broadcasting rules by failing to disclose that the voice of a film about the Gaza situation was the child of a Hamas official, according to UK media regulator Ofcom.
An probe by the media regulator into the programme Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has determined that the programme was "materially misleading".
The chief executive of the broadcaster had earlier expressed regret, saying there had been "a major oversight in relation to factual correctness".
The authority has ordered the corporation to transmit a prime-time announcement about its conclusions.
"As this represents a major infringement of our code, we are ordering the BBC to transmit a announcement of our conclusions against it on BBC2 at 9pm, with a schedule to be confirmed," it said.
'Potential to Damage Credibility'
The regulator's announcement stated: "Our investigation concluded that the programme's omission to reveal that the voice's male guardian held a post in the Hamas-run administration was substantially inaccurate.
"Consequently that the viewers did not have vital facts which may have been highly relevant to their assessment of the narrator and the content he presented.
"Confidence is at the heart of the connection between a broadcaster and its audience, particularly for a state-funded media outlet such as the British Broadcasting Corporation.
"This oversight had the risk to damage the significantly high levels of trust that audiences would have placed in a factual film from the broadcaster about the Gaza conflict."
The programme was withdrawn from iPlayer in last February after the presenter's personal associations were revealed, and in this past July an broadcaster's internal assessment concluded it violated the organization's content policies on truthfulness.
A BBC spokesperson said: "The regulator's decision is in agreement with the conclusions of the corporation's inquiry, that there was a serious error in the documentary in relation to the BBC's Editorial Guidelines on factual correctness, which corresponds to clause 2.2 of the authority's broadcasting regulations.
"We expressed regret for this and we accept the regulator's ruling in its entirety. We will follow the sanction as soon as the schedule and wording are confirmed."
