BBC Gaza Film Deemed a 'Serious' Violation of Broadcasting Standards, States UK Media Regulator
The British broadcaster was found to have committed a "serious breach" of media regulations by omitting to mention that the voice of a documentary about the Gaza situation was the offspring of a Hamas representative, as ruled by British broadcasting authority Ofcom.
An probe by the broadcasting watchdog into Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has found that the film was "significantly deceptive".
The head of the BBC had already issued an apology, noting there had been "a major oversight in relation to truthfulness".
Ofcom has instructed the broadcaster to transmit a peak-time announcement about its conclusions.
"Given this constitutes a serious breach of our code, we are ordering the corporation to transmit a announcement of our findings against it on the BBC's second channel at 9pm, with a timing to be confirmed," the statement read.
'Possibility to Undermine Confidence'
The regulator's announcement said: "Our investigation concluded that the film's omission to reveal that the presenter's father held a post in the Hamas-administered authority was significantly deceptive.
"This implied that the audience did not have critical information which may have been highly relevant to their evaluation of the presenter and the information he presented.
"Trust is at the center of the bond between a media organization and its viewers, notably for a national broadcasting corporation such as the public broadcaster.
"This failing had the potential to undermine the significantly high levels of confidence that the public would have put in a BBC factual programme about the conflict in Gaza."
The programme was removed from the online platform in last February after the presenter's familial connections were revealed, and in July an internal BBC review found it breached the corporation's content policies on factual correctness.
A BBC spokesperson said: "The regulator's decision is in agreement with the conclusions of Peter Johnston's review, that there was a serious error in the documentary in relation to the corporation's content standards on accuracy, which reflects regulation 2.2 of the regulator's media standards.
"We have apologised for this and we agree with Ofcom's decision in its entirety. We will comply with the directive as soon as the date and language are finalised."
