BBC Gaza Film Ruled a 'Serious' Infringement of Media Regulations, Says Broadcasting Watchdog

The British broadcaster was found to have committed a "major breach" of media regulations by not revealing that the narrator of a film about the Gaza conflict was the offspring of a Hamas representative, according to regulatory body Ofcom.

An investigation by Ofcom into the programme Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has found that the documentary was "significantly deceptive".

The chief executive of the broadcaster had previously apologised, saying there had been "a serious error in relation to factual correctness".

Ofcom has ordered the corporation to air a prime-time announcement about its findings.

"Given this constitutes a significant violation of our code, we are directing the broadcaster to broadcast a announcement of our determinations against it on BBC Two at 9pm, with a timing to be confirmed," the regulator stated.

'Risk to Erode Credibility'

The watchdog's announcement declared: "The inquiry we conducted concluded that the documentary's failure to disclose that the voice's male guardian occupied a post in the Hamas-controlled authority was materially misleading.

"It meant that the public did not have vital facts which may have been very significant to their judgment of the voice and the content he provided.

"Trust is at the heart of the bond between a broadcaster and its public, especially for a public service broadcaster such as the BBC.

"This failing had the potential to undermine the very considerable degrees of confidence that audiences would have placed in a documentary produced by the BBC about the conflict in Gaza."

The documentary was pulled from the BBC's streaming service in February after the narrator's familial connections emerged, and in the month of July an corporation's own inquiry concluded it breached the broadcaster's editorial guidelines on accuracy.

A BBC spokesperson said: "The Ofcom ruling is in line with the findings of the internal assessment, that there was a serious error in the film in relation to the BBC's Editorial Guidelines on accuracy, which reflects regulation 2.2 of the authority's broadcasting regulations.

"We issued an apology for this and we accept Ofcom's decision in its entirety. We will follow the sanction as soon as the schedule and language are confirmed."