BBC Gaza Programme Deemed a 'Significant' Infringement of Broadcasting Standards, States Broadcasting Watchdog
The British broadcaster committed a "major breach" of industry standards by failing to disclose that the voice of a film about Gaza was the child of a Hamas official, according to regulatory body Ofcom.
An inquiry by the broadcasting watchdog into the programme Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has determined that the programme was "materially misleading".
The head of the BBC had previously apologised, saying there had been "a significant failing in relation to factual correctness".
Ofcom has ordered the corporation to broadcast a evening declaration about its decisions.
"Given this constitutes a significant violation of our regulations, we are ordering the broadcaster to air a announcement of our determinations against it on BBC Two at nine o'clock in the evening, with a timing to be finalised," it said.
'Potential to Erode Confidence'
The watchdog's report declared: "Our probe determined that the documentary's lack of disclosure that the voice's father served in a post in the Hamas-administered government was substantially inaccurate.
"This implied that the audience did not have essential details which may have been highly relevant to their judgment of the presenter and the information he presented.
"Confidence is at the heart of the relationship between a media organization and its audience, notably for a public service broadcaster such as the British Broadcasting Corporation.
"This oversight had the risk to undermine the significantly high degrees of credibility that audiences would have placed in a BBC factual programme about the Israel-Gaza war."
The programme was withdrawn from the online platform in the month of February after the boy's family links came to light, and in the month of July an broadcaster's internal assessment found it violated the organization's journalistic standards on truthfulness.
A BBC spokesperson stated: "The authority's determination is in line with the results of the internal assessment, that there was a significant failing in the documentary in relation to the corporation's content standards on truthfulness, which reflects Rule 2.2 of the regulator's media standards.
"We issued an apology for this and we accept the authority's determination in full. We will follow the directive as soon as the timing and wording are confirmed."
