British Broadcasting Corporation Gaza Programme Ruled a 'Serious' Infringement of Broadcasting Rules, States Broadcasting Watchdog
The BBC was found to have committed a "significant breach" of media regulations by failing to disclose that the narrator of a film about Gaza was the son of a Hamas official, as determined by British broadcasting authority Ofcom.
An investigation by Ofcom into Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has concluded that the programme was "substantially inaccurate".
The head of the BBC had already issued an apology, saying there had been "a significant failing in relation to factual correctness".
The authority has instructed the BBC to transmit a prime-time announcement about its conclusions.
"Since this amounts to a significant violation of our regulations, we are instructing the BBC to air a announcement of our conclusions against it on BBC Two at nine o'clock in the evening, with a schedule to be confirmed," the statement read.
'Potential to Undermine Trust'
The authority's statement stated: "The inquiry we conducted found that the film's lack of disclosure that the narrator's parent occupied a post in the Hamas-controlled administration was materially misleading.
"It meant that the public did not have essential details which may have been very significant to their evaluation of the narrator and the details he shared.
"Trust is at the heart of the connection between a television network and its viewers, especially for a national broadcasting corporation such as the public broadcaster.
"This oversight had the risk to damage the very considerable levels of trust that audiences would have invested in a documentary produced by the BBC about the Israel-Gaza war."
The film was removed from the BBC's streaming service in the month of February after the narrator's familial connections came to light, and in this past July an internal BBC review concluded it breached the corporation's editorial guidelines on factual correctness.
A BBC spokesperson said: "The regulator's decision is in agreement with the findings of Peter Johnston's review, that there was a significant failing in the programme in relation to the BBC's Editorial Guidelines on accuracy, which reflects Rule 2.2 of Ofcom's Broadcasting Code.
"We issued an apology for this and we comply with the authority's determination in its entirety. We will follow the penalty as soon as the date and wording are confirmed."
