British Broadcasting Corporation Gaza Film Ruled a 'Significant' Violation of Broadcasting Regulations, Says UK Media Regulator
The public service broadcaster engaged in a "major breach" of broadcasting rules by omitting to mention that the narrator of a documentary about the Gaza situation was the offspring of a Hamas administrator, as determined by British broadcasting authority Ofcom.
An investigation by the broadcasting watchdog into Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has determined that the documentary was "substantially inaccurate".
The head of the BBC had already issued an apology, stating there had been "a serious error in relation to truthfulness".
Ofcom has ordered the broadcaster to air a prime-time statement about its decisions.
"Since this amounts to a significant violation of our regulations, we are ordering the broadcaster to transmit a statement of our findings against it on the BBC's second channel at 21:00, with a timing to be finalised," the regulator stated.
'Potential to Erode Credibility'
The watchdog's statement declared: "Our investigation found that the documentary's omission to reveal that the narrator's parent occupied a position in the Hamas-controlled government was substantially inaccurate.
"Consequently that the audience did not have vital facts which may have been extremely pertinent to their evaluation of the presenter and the content he presented.
"Credibility is at the heart of the bond between a television network and its audience, notably for a national broadcasting corporation such as the public broadcaster.
"This oversight had the possibility to damage the significantly high amounts of credibility that the public would have put in a BBC factual programme about the Israel-Gaza war."
The programme was withdrawn from the BBC's streaming service in February after the presenter's familial connections came to light, and in July an broadcaster's internal assessment determined it violated the broadcaster's editorial guidelines on factual correctness.
A representative for the broadcaster said: "The authority's determination is in line with the findings of the corporation's inquiry, that there was a major oversight in the film in relation to the corporation's content standards on truthfulness, which corresponds to regulation 2.2 of the regulator's media standards.
"We have apologised for this and we agree with the regulator's ruling in full. We will comply with the directive as soon as the schedule and language are determined."
