British Broadcasting Corporation Gaza Programme Considered a 'Serious' Infringement of Media Standards, Says Ofcom
The British broadcaster was found to have committed a "major breach" of broadcasting rules by omitting to mention that the voice of a documentary about Gaza was the child of a Hamas representative, according to British broadcasting authority Ofcom.
An probe by the broadcasting watchdog into Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has found that the film was "substantially inaccurate".
The chief executive of the broadcaster had already issued an apology, noting there had been "a major oversight in relation to accuracy".
The regulator has instructed the corporation to broadcast a evening statement about its findings.
"Given this constitutes a significant violation of our regulations, we are instructing the broadcaster to transmit a statement of our conclusions against it on BBC2 at nine o'clock in the evening, with a timing to be confirmed," the regulator stated.
'Possibility to Damage Credibility'
The regulator's report stated: "Our probe determined that the film's omission to reveal that the narrator's father served in a position in the Hamas-administered government was materially misleading.
"Consequently that the viewers did not have vital facts which may have been very significant to their assessment of the presenter and the information he shared.
"Trust is at the core of the connection between a television network and its audience, notably for a state-funded media outlet such as the public broadcaster.
"This failing had the potential to damage the very considerable levels of confidence that the public would have invested in a factual film from the broadcaster about the Gaza conflict."
The programme was pulled from iPlayer in February after the presenter's family links came to light, and in this past July an broadcaster's internal assessment concluded it violated the broadcaster's journalistic standards on accuracy.
A corporation official commented: "The regulator's decision is in agreement with the results of the internal assessment, that there was a major oversight in the documentary in relation to the BBC's Editorial Guidelines on accuracy, which corresponds to regulation 2.2 of the authority's broadcasting regulations.
"We issued an apology for this and we accept Ofcom's decision in its entirety. We will follow the penalty as soon as the schedule and language are finalised."
