BBC Gaza Programme Considered a 'Serious' Infringement of Media Rules, Says UK Media Regulator
The British broadcaster committed a "significant breach" of industry standards by omitting to mention that the voice of a programme about the Gaza conflict was the child of a Hamas administrator, as ruled by UK media regulator Ofcom.
An investigation by the broadcasting watchdog into Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has found that the documentary was "significantly deceptive".
The BBC's director general had previously apologised, saying there had been "a significant failing in relation to truthfulness".
Ofcom has directed the broadcaster to broadcast a evening announcement about its conclusions.
"As this represents a major infringement of our regulations, we are directing the corporation to air a announcement of our conclusions against it on BBC2 at nine o'clock in the evening, with a date to be determined," it said.
'Risk to Erode Confidence'
The regulator's report said: "Our investigation concluded that the film's omission to reveal that the narrator's parent occupied a role in the Hamas-controlled authority was substantially inaccurate.
"This implied that the viewers did not have vital facts which may have been highly relevant to their judgment of the voice and the content he provided.
"Confidence is at the center of the relationship between a television network and its audience, notably for a national broadcasting corporation such as the public broadcaster.
"This error had the risk to undermine the exceptionally strong amounts of trust that audiences would have put in a documentary produced by the BBC about the Gaza conflict."
The programme was withdrawn from the BBC's streaming service in February after the boy's familial connections were revealed, and in July an broadcaster's internal assessment determined it infringed the corporation's editorial guidelines on accuracy.
A BBC spokesperson commented: "The regulator's decision is in agreement with the findings of Peter Johnston's review, that there was a serious error in the film in relation to the corporation's content standards on factual correctness, which corresponds to clause 2.2 of the regulator's media standards.
"We have apologised for this and we accept Ofcom's decision in full. We will comply with the sanction as soon as the date and language are confirmed."