British Broadcasting Corporation Gaza Film Ruled a 'Serious' Infringement of Media Standards, Says Broadcasting Watchdog

The British broadcaster engaged in a "serious breach" of broadcasting rules by omitting to mention that the voice of a film about the Gaza situation was the son of a Hamas representative, as determined by regulatory body Ofcom.

An inquiry by the broadcasting watchdog into the documentary titled Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has concluded that the film was "significantly deceptive".

The head of the BBC had already issued an apology, saying there had been "a major oversight in relation to accuracy".

The regulator has directed the BBC to air a peak-time statement about its decisions.

"As this represents a serious breach of our regulations, we are directing the corporation to transmit a statement of our conclusions against it on BBC Two at 9pm, with a schedule to be confirmed," the regulator stated.

'Risk to Erode Trust'

The watchdog's announcement said: "Our investigation found that the documentary's lack of disclosure that the narrator's parent occupied a post in the Hamas-administered administration was materially misleading.

"This implied that the audience did not have essential details which may have been extremely pertinent to their evaluation of the presenter and the content he provided.

"Credibility is at the heart of the relationship between a media organization and its viewers, especially for a national broadcasting corporation such as the public broadcaster.

"This error had the risk to undermine the exceptionally strong degrees 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The film was withdrawn from the BBC's streaming service in last February after the boy's familial connections were revealed, and in the month of July an internal BBC review determined it infringed the organization's journalistic standards on truthfulness.

A representative for the broadcaster said: "The Ofcom ruling is in accordance with the conclusions of the internal assessment, that there was a major oversight in the film in relation to the corporation's content standards on truthfulness, which corresponds to clause 2.2 of the regulator's media standards.

"We expressed regret for this and we accept the authority's determination in full. We will adhere to the directive as soon as the schedule and language are determined."