BBC Gaza Documentary Considered a 'Major' Breach of Media Standards, Declares Broadcasting Watchdog
The public service broadcaster was found to have committed a "significant breach" of broadcasting rules by omitting to mention that the presenter of a film about Gaza was the offspring of a Hamas representative, as determined by UK media regulator Ofcom.
An probe by the broadcasting watchdog into the programme Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has concluded that the documentary was "materially misleading".
The BBC's director general had earlier expressed regret, stating there had been "a major oversight in relation to factual correctness".
The regulator has instructed the broadcaster to transmit a prime-time statement about its conclusions.
"As this represents a significant violation of our rules, we are directing the broadcaster to transmit a message of our conclusions against it on BBC Two at 21:00, with a date to be finalised," the regulator stated.
'Risk to Damage Credibility'
The watchdog's report said: "Our probe determined that the film's lack of disclosure that the presenter's male guardian held a role in the Hamas-run administration was substantially inaccurate.
"This implied that the audience did not have vital facts which may have been highly relevant to their assessment of the narrator and the details he shared.
"Credibility is at the center of the bond between a media organization and its public, especially for a state-funded media outlet such as the BBC.
"This oversight had the possibility to undermine the very considerable levels of credibility that viewers would have placed in a factual film from the broadcaster about the Israel-Gaza war."
The documentary was withdrawn from the online platform in February after the narrator's personal associations came to light, and in July an corporation's own inquiry found it breached the broadcaster's content policies on factual correctness.
A representative for the broadcaster stated: "The Ofcom ruling is in line with the conclusions of Peter Johnston's review, that there was a serious error in the programme in relation to the corporation's content standards on truthfulness, which reflects regulation 2.2 of Ofcom's Broadcasting Code.
"We expressed regret for this and we accept Ofcom's decision in full. We will follow the directive as soon as the timing and wording are determined."
