British Broadcasting Corporation Gaza Programme Ruled a 'Serious' Breach of Media Standards, States Ofcom
The BBC engaged in a "serious breach" of industry standards by failing to disclose that the presenter of a documentary about Gaza was the son of a Hamas representative, according to regulatory body Ofcom.
An investigation by Ofcom into the documentary titled Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has determined that the documentary was "materially misleading".
The BBC's director general had earlier expressed regret, saying there had been "a major oversight in relation to accuracy".
Ofcom has directed the corporation to broadcast a evening declaration about its decisions.
"Since this amounts to a significant violation of our rules, we are ordering the BBC to broadcast a statement of our findings against it on the BBC's second channel at 9pm, with a timing to be determined," the statement read.
'Possibility to Damage Credibility'
The watchdog's announcement stated: "Our probe found that the film's failure to disclose that the presenter's parent served in a role in the Hamas-run authority was significantly deceptive.
"It meant that the public did not have essential details which may have been very significant to their assessment of the presenter and the details he provided.
"Confidence is at the center of the bond between a media organization and its public, especially for a public service broadcaster such as the BBC.
"This oversight had the possibility to undermine the significantly high levels of confidence that the public would have invested in a documentary produced by the BBC about the Israel-Gaza war."
The film was pulled from iPlayer in last February after the narrator's personal associations came to light, and in the month of July an broadcaster's internal assessment found it infringed the organization's editorial guidelines on truthfulness.
A representative for the broadcaster commented: "The Ofcom ruling is in agreement with the findings of the internal assessment, that there was a major oversight in the programme in relation to the corporation's content standards on truthfulness, which aligns with regulation 2.2 of Ofcom's Broadcasting Code.
"We issued an apology for this and we agree with the authority's determination in complete. We will follow the penalty as soon as the schedule and wording are finalised."
