British Broadcasting Corporation Gaza Documentary Ruled a 'Major' Violation of Media Standards, Says Broadcasting Watchdog
The BBC engaged in a "significant breach" of industry standards by not revealing that the narrator of a programme about the Gaza situation was the child of a Hamas official, as determined by UK media regulator Ofcom.
An investigation by the broadcasting watchdog into the programme Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has concluded that the programme was "substantially inaccurate".
The BBC's director general had previously apologised, saying there had been "a major oversight in relation to accuracy".
The authority has directed the broadcaster to broadcast a prime-time statement about its conclusions.
"Since this amounts to a serious breach of our code, we are ordering the corporation to broadcast a announcement of our findings against it on BBC Two at nine o'clock in the evening, with a date to be finalised," the statement read.
'Risk to Undermine Confidence'
The authority's announcement stated: "The inquiry we conducted found that the documentary's lack of disclosure that the narrator's parent held a position in the Hamas-run administration was substantially inaccurate.
"Consequently that the public did not have essential details which may have been extremely pertinent to their evaluation of the voice and the content he presented.
"Credibility is at the center of the connection between a media organization and its audience, particularly for a public service broadcaster such as the public broadcaster.
"This error had the possibility to damage the very considerable degrees of trust that viewers would have invested in a documentary produced by the BBC about the Gaza conflict."
The film was removed from the online platform in February after the presenter's familial connections emerged, and in this past July an broadcaster's internal assessment found it breached the organization's content policies on accuracy.
A representative for the broadcaster commented: "The regulator's decision is in accordance with the findings of the corporation's inquiry, that there was a serious error in the film in relation to the BBC's Editorial Guidelines on truthfulness, which corresponds to clause 2.2 of the authority's broadcasting regulations.
"We have apologised for this and we accept the regulator's ruling in complete. We will adhere to the directive as soon as the schedule and wording are finalised."
