BBC Gaza Film Ruled a 'Serious' Violation of Media Rules, States Ofcom
The public service broadcaster committed a "serious breach" of industry standards by not revealing that the presenter of a programme about Gaza was the son of a Hamas administrator, as ruled by British broadcasting authority Ofcom.
An inquiry by the broadcasting watchdog into the programme Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has concluded that the programme was "significantly deceptive".
The BBC's director general had already issued an apology, saying there had been "a serious error in relation to factual correctness".
The regulator has directed the broadcaster to air a evening declaration about its findings.
"As this represents a serious breach of our rules, we are ordering the broadcaster to transmit a message of our findings against it on BBC Two at nine o'clock in the evening, with a schedule to be confirmed," the regulator stated.
'Risk to Undermine Confidence'
The regulator's statement stated: "The inquiry we conducted determined that the programme's failure to disclose that the voice's parent served in a post in the Hamas-administered government was significantly deceptive.
"This implied that the audience did not have critical information which may have been highly relevant to their judgment of the presenter and the details he presented.
"Confidence is at the core of the relationship between a media organization and its viewers, especially for a public service broadcaster such as the BBC.
"This oversight had the risk to erode the exceptionally strong amounts of trust that viewers would have put in a BBC factual programme about the Gaza conflict."
The programme was removed from the BBC's streaming service in February after the boy's familial connections emerged, and in this past July an broadcaster's internal assessment determined it violated the broadcaster's editorial guidelines on truthfulness.
A BBC spokesperson commented: "The authority's determination is in line with the results of Peter Johnston's review, that there was a major oversight in the programme in relation to the broadcaster's journalistic policies on accuracy, which corresponds to Rule 2.2 of the authority's broadcasting regulations.
"We issued an apology for this and we accept Ofcom's decision in full. We will adhere to the sanction as soon as the date and wording are determined."
