British Broadcasting Corporation Gaza Programme Deemed a 'Major' Violation of Broadcasting Regulations, States Broadcasting Watchdog
The BBC committed a "serious breach" of broadcasting rules by omitting to mention that the presenter of a programme about Gaza was the offspring of a Hamas administrator, as ruled by regulatory body Ofcom.
An inquiry by Ofcom into the documentary titled Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has determined that the documentary was "materially misleading".
The head of the BBC had already issued an apology, stating there had been "a serious error in relation to accuracy".
The regulator has ordered the corporation to broadcast a prime-time declaration about its decisions.
"Given this constitutes a significant violation of our rules, we are instructing the corporation to broadcast a statement of our determinations against it on the BBC's second channel at nine o'clock in the evening, with a timing to be determined," the regulator stated.
'Possibility to Undermine Credibility'
The regulator's statement declared: "The inquiry we conducted determined that the film's failure to disclose that the presenter's parent held a post in the Hamas-administered administration was significantly deceptive.
"This implied that the audience did not have critical information which may have been highly relevant to their judgment of the voice and the content he provided.
"Trust is at the center of the relationship between a television network and its viewers, especially for a national broadcasting corporation such as the BBC.
"This error had the risk to undermine the significantly high levels of trust that viewers would have invested in a BBC factual programme about the Gaza conflict."
The documentary was pulled from the online platform in the month of February after the boy's familial connections emerged, and in July an broadcaster's internal assessment found it breached the organization's editorial guidelines on accuracy.
A representative for the broadcaster commented: "The authority's determination is in accordance with the results of the corporation's inquiry, that there was a serious error in the programme in relation to the BBC's Editorial Guidelines on accuracy, which corresponds to clause 2.2 of the authority's broadcasting regulations.
"We expressed regret for this and we accept Ofcom's decision in full. We will comply with the directive as soon as the timing and language are confirmed."
