British Broadcasting Corporation Gaza Programme Deemed a 'Serious' Breach of Media Rules, Declares Broadcasting Watchdog
The BBC committed a "major breach" of industry standards by omitting to mention that the presenter of a film about the Gaza situation was the son of a Hamas representative, according to British broadcasting authority Ofcom.
An probe by the media regulator into the programme Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has concluded that the documentary was "materially misleading".
The head of the BBC had previously apologised, stating there had been "a major oversight in relation to factual correctness".
The regulator has instructed the corporation to transmit a peak-time statement about its conclusions.
"Given this constitutes a major infringement of our regulations, we are directing the corporation to air a statement of our findings against it on BBC2 at nine o'clock in the evening, with a date to be confirmed," the statement read.
'Potential to Erode Trust'
The regulator's statement declared: "Our probe concluded that the programme's failure to disclose that the voice's male guardian occupied a role in the Hamas-run government was materially misleading.
"This implied that the public did not have critical information which may have been highly relevant to their assessment of the voice and the content he provided.
"Credibility is at the heart of the bond between a broadcaster and its viewers, particularly for a national broadcasting corporation such as the public broadcaster.
"This oversight had the possibility to erode the very considerable levels of confidence that viewers would have placed in a factual film from the broadcaster about the Gaza conflict."
The programme was withdrawn from the online platform in February after the presenter's personal associations came to light, and in the month of July an internal BBC review concluded it breached the broadcaster's editorial guidelines on factual correctness.
A BBC spokesperson commented: "The Ofcom ruling is in line with the findings of the internal assessment, that there was a significant failing in the film in relation to the corporation's content standards on accuracy, which reflects clause 2.2 of the regulator's media standards.
"We issued an apology for this and we accept the regulator's ruling in its entirety. We will follow the directive as soon as the schedule and wording are determined."
