BBC Gaza Programme Deemed a 'Serious' Infringement of Broadcasting Standards, States Broadcasting Watchdog
The British broadcaster was found to have committed a "serious breach" of broadcasting rules by not revealing that the voice of a programme about the Gaza conflict was the child of a Hamas representative, as determined by British broadcasting authority Ofcom.
An inquiry by the media regulator into Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has concluded that the documentary was "materially misleading".
The BBC's director general had earlier expressed regret, noting there had been "a significant failing in relation to accuracy".
The authority has directed the corporation to broadcast a prime-time statement about its conclusions.
"As this represents a serious breach of our code, we are ordering the corporation to broadcast a announcement of our findings against it on the BBC's second channel at nine o'clock in the evening, with a date to be finalised," the regulator stated.
'Risk to Damage Trust'
The authority's report stated: "Our investigation determined that the documentary's failure to disclose that the voice's male guardian occupied a role in the Hamas-run government was substantially inaccurate.
"It meant that the viewers did not have critical information which may have been very significant to their judgment of the voice and the details he presented.
"Trust is at the center of the bond between a television network and its viewers, especially for a state-funded media outlet such as the British Broadcasting Corporation.
"This oversight had the possibility to damage the exceptionally strong degrees of credibility that the public would have placed in a BBC factual programme about the conflict in Gaza."
The programme was withdrawn from the online platform in the month of February after the boy's family links emerged, and in July an corporation's own inquiry determined it breached the broadcaster's editorial guidelines on factual correctness.
A corporation official said: "The Ofcom ruling is in agreement with the findings of the internal assessment, that there was a major oversight in the film in relation to the corporation's content standards on truthfulness, which reflects Rule 2.2 of Ofcom's Broadcasting Code.
"We issued an apology for this and we comply with Ofcom's decision in complete. We will comply with the penalty as soon as the schedule and wording are determined."
