British Broadcasting Corporation Gaza Programme Ruled a 'Serious' Breach of Media Regulations, Declares Broadcasting Watchdog
The public service broadcaster committed a "major breach" of media regulations by failing to disclose that the voice of a film about Gaza was the child of a Hamas administrator, as ruled by British broadcasting authority Ofcom.
An inquiry by Ofcom into the programme Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has determined that the film was "significantly deceptive".
The head of the BBC had previously apologised, noting there had been "a significant failing in relation to factual correctness".
Ofcom has ordered the BBC to air a evening statement about its decisions.
"As this represents a significant violation of our regulations, we are instructing the broadcaster to broadcast a statement of our findings against it on BBC Two at 9pm, with a schedule to be confirmed," the regulator stated.
'Potential to Erode Credibility'
The authority's report stated: "Our probe determined that the documentary's failure to disclose that the presenter's parent served in a post in the Hamas-controlled administration was substantially inaccurate.
"It meant that the audience did not have essential details which may have been extremely pertinent to their assessment of the presenter and the details he presented.
"Credibility is at the heart of the connection between a broadcaster and its public, especially for a state-funded media outlet such as the BBC.
"This failing had the potential to undermine the significantly high levels of trust that viewers would have placed in a documentary produced by the BBC about the conflict in Gaza."
The documentary was pulled from the online platform in February after the boy's family links emerged, and in the month of July an internal BBC review determined it breached the broadcaster's editorial guidelines on truthfulness.
A BBC spokesperson commented: "The Ofcom ruling is in agreement with the conclusions of the corporation's inquiry, that there was a major oversight in the documentary in relation to the broadcaster's journalistic policies on truthfulness, which corresponds to regulation 2.2 of Ofcom's Broadcasting Code.
"We issued an apology for this and we comply with the authority's determination in complete. We will follow the penalty as soon as the schedule and wording are finalised."