BBC Gaza Film Ruled a 'Serious' Breach of Media Rules, Declares Ofcom
The public service broadcaster was found to have committed a "serious breach" of industry standards by not revealing that the voice of a documentary about Gaza was the child of a Hamas administrator, as determined by UK media regulator Ofcom.
An inquiry by the media regulator into the documentary titled Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has concluded that the film was "substantially inaccurate".
The chief executive of the broadcaster had earlier expressed regret, stating there had been "a major oversight in relation to accuracy".
The regulator has instructed the BBC to transmit a prime-time statement about its findings.
"As this represents a significant violation of our code, we are directing the broadcaster to air a announcement of our determinations against it on BBC2 at 21:00, with a date to be finalised," the statement read.
'Risk to Erode Confidence'
The watchdog's statement said: "Our investigation found that the film's failure to disclose that the narrator's parent held a position in the Hamas-controlled administration was substantially inaccurate.
"Consequently that the viewers did not have critical information which may have been extremely pertinent to their judgment of the presenter and the content he provided.
"Credibility is at the center of the connection between a television network and its audience, notably for a public service broadcaster such as the British Broadcasting Corporation.
"This error had the risk to damage the significantly high amounts of credibility that the public would have placed in a documentary produced by the BBC about the conflict in Gaza."
The film was removed from iPlayer in February after the narrator's personal associations came to light, and in July an broadcaster's internal assessment determined it violated the organization's content policies on accuracy.
A corporation official commented: "The authority's determination is in agreement with the results of the internal assessment, that there was a serious error in the film in relation to the broadcaster's journalistic policies on truthfulness, which aligns with Rule 2.2 of the regulator's media standards.
"We issued an apology for this and we agree with the regulator's ruling in complete. We will adhere to the sanction as soon as the date and wording are confirmed."
