British Broadcasting Corporation Gaza Film Deemed a 'Significant' Infringement of Broadcasting Regulations, Says Broadcasting Watchdog

The BBC was found to have committed a "major breach" of broadcasting rules by failing to disclose that the voice of a programme about the Gaza situation was the offspring of a Hamas official, as ruled by UK media regulator Ofcom.

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

The chief executive of the broadcaster had already issued an apology, saying there had been "a significant failing in relation to accuracy".

The authority has directed the broadcaster to transmit a evening announcement about its conclusions.

"Given this constitutes a significant violation of our regulations, we are directing the corporation to air a message of our findings against it on BBC2 at nine o'clock in the evening, with a schedule to be determined," the regulator stated.

'Risk to Erode Confidence'

The regulator's statement stated: "Our probe determined that the documentary's lack of disclosure that the narrator's parent served in a position in the Hamas-controlled authority was materially misleading.

"This implied that the public did not have essential details which may have been very significant to their assessment of the voice and the content he presented.

"Trust is at the core of the connection between a media organization and its audience, particularly for a public service broadcaster such as the British Broadcasting Corporation.

"This failing had the possibility to undermine the significantly high amounts of trust that the public would have put in a factual film from the broadcaster about the Gaza conflict."

The film was withdrawn from the online platform in last February after the boy's personal associations were revealed, and in this past July an broadcaster's internal assessment found it infringed the corporation's editorial guidelines on truthfulness.

A BBC spokesperson said: "The authority's determination is in accordance with the conclusions of Peter Johnston's review, that there was a significant failing in the documentary in relation to the BBC's Editorial Guidelines on truthfulness, which corresponds to Rule 2.2 of the regulator's media standards.

"We have apologised for this and we accept the authority's determination in full. We will comply with the directive as soon as the timing and language are determined."