BBC Gaza Programme Considered a 'Significant' Violation of Media Regulations, Says Broadcasting Watchdog
The public service broadcaster committed a "serious breach" of broadcasting rules by not revealing that the voice of a programme about the Gaza situation was the offspring of a Hamas representative, as ruled by UK media regulator Ofcom.
An investigation by the media regulator into the documentary titled Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has determined that the film was "significantly deceptive".
The BBC's director general had earlier expressed regret, stating there had been "a serious error in relation to factual correctness".
Ofcom has instructed the BBC to broadcast a peak-time statement about its findings.
"Since this amounts to a serious breach of our code, we are instructing the broadcaster to broadcast a statement of our determinations against it on BBC2 at 9pm, with a schedule to be finalised," the regulator stated.
'Risk to Undermine Confidence'
The watchdog's statement said: "The inquiry we conducted determined that the programme's failure to disclose that the voice's male guardian served in a role in the Hamas-administered administration was significantly deceptive.
"It meant that the audience did not have vital facts which may have been extremely pertinent to their evaluation of the narrator and the details he shared.
"Confidence is at the core of the connection between a television network and its audience, notably for a public service broadcaster such as the public broadcaster.
"This oversight had the potential to erode the exceptionally strong amounts of credibility that audiences would have invested in a BBC factual programme about the Israel-Gaza war."
The programme was pulled from the online platform in last February after the boy's family links came to light, and in the month of July an corporation's own inquiry concluded it breached the broadcaster's journalistic standards on factual correctness.
A BBC spokesperson commented: "The Ofcom ruling is in agreement with the conclusions of the internal assessment, that there was a major oversight in the programme in relation to the corporation's content standards on truthfulness, which aligns with Rule 2.2 of Ofcom's Broadcasting Code.
"We expressed regret for this and we accept the authority's determination in full. We will adhere to the penalty as soon as the timing and wording are confirmed."
