BBC Gaza Film Ruled a 'Significant' Infringement of Media Regulations, Declares Broadcasting Watchdog

The public service broadcaster engaged in a "serious breach" of broadcasting rules by not revealing that the narrator of a programme about the Gaza situation was the son of a Hamas administrator, as determined by British broadcasting authority Ofcom.

An investigation by Ofcom into the documentary titled Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has concluded that the programme was "significantly deceptive".

The head of the BBC had previously apologised, saying there had been "a major oversight in relation to factual correctness".

Ofcom has ordered the BBC to broadcast a peak-time declaration about its conclusions.

"Given this constitutes a major infringement of our regulations, we are instructing the corporation to broadcast a message of our determinations against it on BBC Two at 9pm, with a timing to be confirmed," the statement read.

'Risk to Damage Trust'

The authority's statement said: "Our probe found that the programme's omission to reveal that the voice's father served in a role in the Hamas-controlled administration was significantly deceptive.

"Consequently that the public did not have essential details which may have been very significant to their evaluation of the narrator and the content he shared.

"Credibility is at the core of the connection between a television network and its public, notably for a state-funded media outlet such as the public broadcaster.

"This failing had the possibility to undermine the exceptionally strong amounts of trust that the public would have invested in a documentary produced by the BBC about the Gaza conflict."

The programme was withdrawn from iPlayer in last February after the presenter's family links were revealed, and in the month of July an corporation's own inquiry found it violated the corporation's editorial guidelines on factual correctness.

A corporation official stated: "The authority's determination is in line with the findings of the internal assessment, that there was a major oversight in the film in relation to the broadcaster's journalistic policies on accuracy, which corresponds to regulation 2.2 of Ofcom's Broadcasting Code.

"We expressed regret for this and we accept Ofcom's decision in its entirety. We will follow the directive as soon as the schedule and wording are determined."