British Broadcasting Corporation Gaza Film Ruled a 'Significant' Breach of Media Regulations, States UK Media Regulator

The public service broadcaster committed a "major breach" of media regulations by omitting to mention that the narrator of a programme about Gaza was the son of a Hamas official, as ruled by regulatory body Ofcom.

An inquiry by the media regulator into Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has found that the programme was "significantly deceptive".

The BBC's director general had already issued an apology, stating there had been "a major oversight in relation to truthfulness".

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

"Given this constitutes a significant violation of our rules, we are ordering the corporation to air a statement of our determinations against it on the BBC's second channel at 21:00, with a timing to be confirmed," it said.

'Potential to Undermine Trust'

The authority's statement said: "Our investigation found that the programme's lack of disclosure that the voice's parent occupied a role in the Hamas-administered administration was substantially inaccurate.

"It meant that the viewers did not have vital facts which may have been extremely pertinent to their judgment of the voice and the details he shared.

"Confidence is at the center of the relationship between a television network and its viewers, especially for a state-funded media outlet such as the BBC.

"This error had the potential to damage the exceptionally strong degrees of confidence that audiences would have put in a BBC factual programme about the Israel-Gaza war."

The film was withdrawn from iPlayer in last February after the presenter's personal associations were revealed, and in July an internal BBC review found it breached the organization's journalistic standards on accuracy.

A representative for the broadcaster commented: "The regulator's decision is in agreement with the findings of the internal assessment, that there was a significant failing in the programme in relation to the broadcaster's journalistic policies on factual correctness, which corresponds to clause 2.2 of Ofcom's Broadcasting Code.

"We expressed regret for this and we agree with Ofcom's decision in its entirety. We will adhere to the penalty as soon as the schedule and language are determined."