BBC Gaza Film Ruled a 'Serious' Violation of Media Rules, States Ofcom
The British broadcaster was found to have committed a "serious breach" of broadcasting rules by not revealing that the voice of a film about Gaza was the offspring of a Hamas administrator, according to regulatory body Ofcom.
An investigation by Ofcom into the programme Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has determined that the programme was "significantly deceptive".
The BBC's director general had previously apologised, noting there had been "a major oversight in relation to truthfulness".
The regulator has directed the broadcaster to air a prime-time announcement about its findings.
"Given this constitutes a major infringement of our rules, we are instructing the BBC to transmit a statement of our findings against it on BBC Two at 9pm, with a date to be confirmed," the regulator stated.
'Risk to Damage Credibility'
The regulator's statement said: "Our investigation concluded that the documentary's lack of disclosure that the voice's male guardian occupied a position in the Hamas-administered administration was significantly deceptive.
"It meant that the audience did not have critical information which may have been highly relevant to their evaluation of the voice and the details he presented.
"Credibility is at the core of the connection between a television network and its audience, especially for a state-funded media outlet such as the public broadcaster.
"This failing had the risk to damage the very considerable levels of confidence that the public would have put in a documentary produced by the BBC about the Israel-Gaza war."
The programme was pulled from the BBC's streaming service in the month of February after the presenter's family links came to light, and in July an internal BBC review concluded it violated the corporation's content policies on factual correctness.
A representative for the broadcaster commented: "The regulator's decision is in agreement with the conclusions of Peter Johnston's review, that there was a significant failing in the film in relation to the corporation's content standards on accuracy, which aligns with regulation 2.2 of the authority's broadcasting regulations.
"We issued an apology for this and we comply with Ofcom's decision in complete. We will comply with the directive as soon as the date and wording are finalised."
