British Broadcasting Corporation Gaza Film Considered a 'Major' Infringement of Broadcasting Standards, States UK Media Regulator
The public service broadcaster engaged in a "significant breach" of broadcasting rules by not revealing that the presenter of a documentary about the Gaza conflict was the son of a Hamas representative, as determined by UK media regulator Ofcom.
An investigation by Ofcom into the documentary titled Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has determined that the documentary was "substantially inaccurate".
The head of the BBC had earlier expressed regret, stating there had been "a major oversight in relation to truthfulness".
Ofcom has ordered the broadcaster to broadcast a prime-time statement about its findings.
"Since this amounts to a major infringement of our regulations, we are instructing the broadcaster to broadcast a message of our determinations against it on BBC2 at 21:00, with a date to be determined," the regulator stated.
'Potential to Undermine Confidence'
The watchdog's announcement said: "Our probe determined that the programme's lack of disclosure that the narrator's male guardian occupied a post in the Hamas-run government was substantially inaccurate.
"This implied that the public did not have essential details which may have been extremely pertinent to their assessment of the presenter and the information he shared.
"Confidence is at the center of the relationship between a broadcaster and its viewers, particularly for a state-funded media outlet such as the BBC.
"This error had the risk to damage the exceptionally strong levels of trust that audiences would have put in a documentary produced by the BBC about the conflict in Gaza."
The programme was pulled from the BBC's streaming service in the month of February after the boy's familial connections emerged, and in July an corporation's own inquiry determined it violated the broadcaster's journalistic standards on truthfulness.
A corporation official commented: "The Ofcom ruling is in agreement with the findings of Peter Johnston's review, that there was a major oversight in the film in relation to the broadcaster's journalistic policies on truthfulness, which aligns with Rule 2.2 of the regulator's media standards.
"We have apologised for this and we agree with the authority's determination in complete. We will follow the sanction as soon as the schedule and language are finalised."
