British Broadcasting Corporation Gaza Film Considered a 'Serious' Breach of Media Regulations, States UK Media Regulator

The public service broadcaster engaged in a "major breach" of broadcasting rules by not revealing that the voice of a film about the Gaza situation was the son of a Hamas official, as ruled by UK media regulator Ofcom.

An probe by the broadcasting watchdog into the documentary titled Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has determined that the programme was "materially misleading".

The chief executive of the broadcaster had already issued an apology, saying there had been "a significant failing in relation to accuracy".

The regulator has ordered the broadcaster to broadcast a peak-time declaration about its conclusions.

"Since this amounts to a major infringement of our rules, we are instructing the corporation to broadcast a statement of our determinations against it on BBC2 at 21:00, with a schedule to be determined," the statement read.

'Possibility to Undermine Confidence'

The watchdog's announcement stated: "Our investigation determined that the film's failure to disclose that the narrator's father held a role in the Hamas-run administration was materially misleading.

"Consequently that the public did not have vital facts which may have been extremely pertinent to their judgment of the presenter and the content he provided.

"Credibility is at the center of the connection between a media organization and its audience, especially for a state-funded media outlet such as the British Broadcasting Corporation.

"This error had the possibility to erode the exceptionally strong amounts of confidence that the public would have invested in a factual film from the broadcaster about the conflict in Gaza."

The documentary was withdrawn from iPlayer in the month of February after the boy's family links emerged, and in July an corporation's own inquiry found it breached the broadcaster's content policies on truthfulness.

A representative for the broadcaster commented: "The regulator's decision is in accordance with the findings of Peter Johnston's review, that there was a major oversight in the documentary in relation to the BBC's Editorial Guidelines on accuracy, which reflects clause 2.2 of the authority's broadcasting regulations.

"We have apologised for this and we comply with the regulator's ruling in full. We will follow the sanction as soon as the schedule and language are confirmed."