British Broadcasting Corporation Gaza Documentary Ruled a 'Major' Breach of Media Rules, States UK Media Regulator
The BBC committed a "major breach" of media regulations by omitting to mention that the presenter of a programme about Gaza was the offspring of a Hamas representative, according to UK media regulator Ofcom.
An inquiry by the broadcasting watchdog into the documentary titled Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has concluded that the film was "materially misleading".
The head of the BBC had earlier expressed regret, noting there had been "a significant failing in relation to truthfulness".
The authority has directed the BBC to air a evening declaration about its findings.
"Since this amounts to a serious breach of our code, we are directing the corporation to air a message of our conclusions against it on BBC2 at nine o'clock in the evening, with a date to be finalised," the statement read.
'Possibility to Damage Credibility'
The regulator's announcement said: "Our probe concluded that the programme's failure to disclose that the presenter's male guardian occupied a post in the Hamas-run government was substantially inaccurate.
"It meant that the public did not have essential details which may have been extremely pertinent to their assessment of the voice and the content he provided.
"Credibility is at the center of the bond between a media organization and its public, particularly for a public service broadcaster such as the British Broadcasting Corporation.
"This error had the potential to damage the very considerable degrees of credibility that the public would have placed in a documentary produced by the BBC about the Israel-Gaza war."
The programme was removed from iPlayer in last February after the boy's family links came to light, and in this past July an broadcaster's internal assessment found it violated the organization's editorial guidelines on factual correctness.
A BBC spokesperson said: "The regulator's decision is in accordance with the results of the internal assessment, that there was a major oversight in the programme in relation to the broadcaster's journalistic policies on accuracy, which corresponds to clause 2.2 of Ofcom's Broadcasting Code.
"We issued an apology for this and we agree with Ofcom's decision in its entirety. We will follow the directive as soon as the timing and wording are finalised."
