British Broadcasting Corporation Gaza Programme Ruled a 'Serious' Violation of Broadcasting Rules, Says Ofcom

The public service broadcaster engaged in a "major breach" of media regulations by failing to disclose that the voice of a programme about Gaza was the son of a Hamas official, as determined by British broadcasting authority Ofcom.

An inquiry by Ofcom into the programme Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has determined that the film was "materially misleading".

The chief executive of the broadcaster had already issued an apology, stating there had been "a significant failing in relation to truthfulness".

Ofcom has ordered the corporation to broadcast a prime-time announcement about its conclusions.

"As this represents a significant violation of our code, we are directing the corporation to air a statement of our findings against it on BBC2 at nine o'clock in the evening, with a timing to be determined," the regulator stated.

'Possibility to Undermine Credibility'

The authority's report stated: "Our probe determined that the documentary's omission to reveal that the narrator's parent served in a position in the Hamas-administered authority was substantially inaccurate.

"Consequently that the audience did not have critical information which may have been highly relevant to their assessment of the narrator and the details he presented.

"Trust is at the core of the relationship between a broadcaster and its viewers, particularly for a national broadcasting corporation such as the BBC.

"This error had the potential to damage the significantly high degrees of credibility that audiences would have put in a factual film from the broadcaster about the conflict in Gaza."

The programme was removed from iPlayer in the month of February after the boy's family links were revealed, and in the month of July an internal BBC review concluded it violated the broadcaster's content policies on factual correctness.

A representative for the broadcaster stated: "The Ofcom ruling is in accordance with the conclusions of the corporation's inquiry, that there was a major oversight in the documentary in relation to the corporation's content standards on accuracy, which reflects regulation 2.2 of the authority's broadcasting regulations.

"We issued an apology for this and we agree with Ofcom's decision in complete. We will follow the directive as soon as the timing and language are confirmed."