British Broadcasting Corporation Gaza Programme Deemed a 'Serious' Violation of Broadcasting Standards, Declares Ofcom
The British broadcaster committed a "major breach" of industry standards by failing to disclose that the presenter of a documentary about the Gaza situation was the offspring of a Hamas official, as determined by regulatory body Ofcom.
An investigation by the broadcasting watchdog into Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has determined that the documentary was "materially misleading".
The chief executive of the broadcaster had earlier expressed regret, noting there had been "a significant failing in relation to accuracy".
The regulator has directed the broadcaster to transmit a prime-time statement about its conclusions.
"Given this constitutes a significant violation of our code, we are instructing the corporation to air a announcement of our determinations against it on BBC2 at 9pm, with a schedule to be confirmed," it said.
'Potential to Damage Credibility'
The regulator's statement declared: "Our probe found that the programme's failure to disclose that the narrator's father held a role in the Hamas-controlled administration was substantially inaccurate.
"It meant that the audience did not have essential details which may have been highly relevant to their evaluation of the voice and the information he shared.
"Credibility is at the heart of the relationship between a broadcaster and its audience, particularly for a public service broadcaster such as the BBC.
"This failing had the risk to damage the very considerable amounts of confidence that the public would have placed in a BBC factual programme about the Israel-Gaza war."
The documentary was pulled from the BBC's streaming service in February after the narrator's personal associations came to light, and in July an corporation's own inquiry found it infringed the corporation's journalistic standards on truthfulness.
A representative for the broadcaster commented: "The authority's determination is in line with the conclusions of Peter Johnston's review, that there was a significant failing in the film in relation to the corporation's content standards on factual correctness, which reflects regulation 2.2 of the regulator's media standards.
"We issued an apology for this and we agree with the regulator's ruling in its entirety. We will adhere to the directive as soon as the date and wording are finalised."
