British Broadcasting Corporation Gaza Film Ruled a 'Serious' Infringement of Broadcasting Regulations, Declares Ofcom
The public service broadcaster committed a "significant breach" of media regulations by failing to disclose that the narrator of a documentary about Gaza was the son of a Hamas representative, as ruled by regulatory body Ofcom.
An investigation by the broadcasting watchdog into the documentary titled Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has found that the programme was "substantially inaccurate".
The BBC's director general had earlier expressed regret, saying there had been "a serious error in relation to factual correctness".
The regulator has instructed the corporation to broadcast a peak-time announcement about its conclusions.
"As this represents a major infringement of our regulations, we are instructing the BBC to broadcast a announcement of our findings against it on the BBC's second channel at 9pm, with a schedule to be determined," it said.
'Potential to Damage Credibility'
The watchdog's announcement declared: "Our probe found that the programme's lack of disclosure that the narrator's father occupied a role in the Hamas-run government was significantly deceptive.
"It meant that the audience did not have vital facts which may have been highly relevant to their assessment of the voice and the details he shared.
"Trust is at the core of the relationship between a television network and its audience, particularly for a national broadcasting corporation such as the BBC.
"This failing had the potential to damage the significantly high amounts of confidence that audiences would have invested in a BBC factual programme about the Israel-Gaza war."
The programme was pulled from the BBC's streaming service in last February after the presenter's familial connections emerged, and in this past July an broadcaster's internal assessment concluded it violated the corporation's journalistic standards on accuracy.
A corporation official stated: "The regulator's decision is in accordance with the results of Peter Johnston's review, that there was a major oversight in the programme in relation to the BBC's Editorial Guidelines on accuracy, which aligns with Rule 2.2 of the authority's broadcasting regulations.
"We expressed regret for this and we comply with Ofcom's decision in full. We will comply with the directive as soon as the timing and wording are determined."
