British Broadcasting Corporation Gaza Programme Deemed a 'Major' Violation of Media Rules, Declares Ofcom
The public service broadcaster engaged in a "serious breach" of industry standards by omitting to mention that the presenter of a documentary about Gaza was the child of a Hamas official, as ruled by regulatory body Ofcom.
An inquiry by Ofcom into the programme Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has determined that the documentary was "materially misleading".
The chief executive of the broadcaster had previously apologised, stating there had been "a major oversight in relation to accuracy".
The regulator has directed the broadcaster to transmit a peak-time declaration about its decisions.
"As this represents a major infringement of our regulations, we are directing the corporation to air a statement of our determinations against it on BBC Two at 21:00, with a date to be finalised," the statement read.
'Potential to Damage Confidence'
The authority's statement said: "The inquiry we conducted determined that the documentary's lack of disclosure that the presenter's parent held a role in the Hamas-run authority was substantially inaccurate.
"Consequently that the audience did not have critical information which may have been extremely pertinent to their judgment of the voice and the details he presented.
"Trust is at the center of the connection between a media organization and its audience, notably for a national broadcasting corporation such as the public broadcaster.
"This oversight had the risk to erode the exceptionally strong degrees of trust that the public would have put in a documentary produced by the BBC about the Gaza conflict."
The film was pulled from the online platform in February after the presenter's familial connections were revealed, and in this past July an broadcaster's internal assessment found it infringed the corporation's content policies on accuracy.
A representative for the broadcaster stated: "The Ofcom ruling is in accordance with the results of the corporation's inquiry, that there was a significant failing in the film in relation to the broadcaster's journalistic policies on truthfulness, which aligns with clause 2.2 of the authority's broadcasting regulations.
"We expressed regret for this and we agree with the regulator's ruling in its entirety. We will comply with the directive as soon as the schedule and language are finalised."
