BBC Gaza Documentary Considered a 'Significant' Infringement of Broadcasting Regulations, Says Ofcom
The BBC committed a "significant breach" of industry standards by failing to disclose that the presenter of a documentary about the Gaza conflict was the offspring of a Hamas official, according to regulatory body Ofcom.
An inquiry by the broadcasting watchdog into the documentary titled Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has determined that the film was "substantially inaccurate".
The head of the BBC had earlier expressed regret, 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 major infringement of our rules, we are directing the BBC to transmit a statement of our findings against it on BBC Two at 9pm, with a date to be confirmed," the statement read.
'Possibility to Undermine Credibility'
The authority's report stated: "Our investigation concluded that the film's failure to disclose that the presenter's father occupied a post in the Hamas-run administration was significantly deceptive.
"This implied that the audience did not have essential details which may have been extremely pertinent to their evaluation of the narrator and the content he presented.
"Confidence is at the center of the bond between a television network and its viewers, especially for a national broadcasting corporation such as the BBC.
"This error had the possibility to undermine the very considerable levels of trust that audiences would have put in a documentary produced by the BBC about the Gaza conflict."
The documentary was withdrawn from the BBC's streaming service in February after the boy's familial connections were revealed, and in the month of July an corporation's own inquiry determined it infringed the broadcaster's journalistic standards on accuracy.
A BBC spokesperson commented: "The Ofcom ruling is in agreement with the findings of the internal assessment, that there was a serious error in the documentary in relation to the broadcaster's journalistic policies on factual correctness, which aligns with clause 2.2 of Ofcom's Broadcasting Code.
"We expressed regret for this and we comply with the regulator's ruling in complete. We will follow the sanction as soon as the schedule and wording are confirmed."
