British Broadcasting Corporation Gaza Documentary Deemed a 'Serious' Violation of Media Standards, Says UK Media Regulator
The British broadcaster committed a "serious breach" of industry standards by failing to disclose that the narrator of a programme about the Gaza conflict was the offspring of a Hamas administrator, as determined by regulatory body Ofcom.
An inquiry by the broadcasting watchdog into Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has found that the documentary was "materially misleading".
The chief executive of the broadcaster had earlier expressed regret, noting there had been "a major oversight in relation to factual correctness".
Ofcom has ordered the broadcaster to transmit a evening statement about its findings.
"Given this constitutes a serious breach of our rules, we are directing the broadcaster to air a message of our conclusions against it on BBC2 at 9pm, with a schedule to be determined," the regulator stated.
'Possibility to Damage Credibility'
The authority's report declared: "Our investigation determined that the documentary's omission to reveal that the voice's male guardian held a role in the Hamas-controlled authority was materially misleading.
"This implied that the public did not have essential details which may have been very significant to their judgment of the presenter and the details he provided.
"Confidence is at the center of the connection between a media organization and its public, especially for a national broadcasting corporation such as the British Broadcasting Corporation.
"This oversight had the possibility to damage the very considerable degrees of trust that audiences would have put in a factual film from the broadcaster about the Gaza conflict."
The film was pulled from the online platform in the month of February after the presenter's personal associations emerged, and in this past July an broadcaster's internal assessment determined it infringed the corporation's content policies on truthfulness.
A corporation official stated: "The regulator's decision is in agreement with the conclusions of the internal assessment, that there was a major oversight in the film in relation to the BBC's Editorial Guidelines on factual correctness, which reflects clause 2.2 of Ofcom's Broadcasting Code.
"We issued an apology for this and we comply with the authority's determination in its entirety. We will follow the penalty as soon as the date and wording are determined."
