British Broadcasting Corporation Gaza Programme Considered a 'Serious' Breach of Broadcasting Standards, Declares Broadcasting Watchdog
The British broadcaster engaged in a "serious breach" of broadcasting rules by not revealing that the voice of a programme about Gaza was the son of a Hamas representative, as determined by UK media regulator Ofcom.
An inquiry by the broadcasting watchdog into the documentary titled Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has concluded that the programme was "materially misleading".
The chief executive of the broadcaster had previously apologised, saying there had been "a serious error in relation to accuracy".
The authority has directed the corporation to broadcast a evening declaration about its conclusions.
"Since this amounts to a major infringement of our code, we are directing the corporation to air a statement of our conclusions against it on BBC Two at 9pm, with a date to be confirmed," the statement read.
'Risk to Erode Credibility'
The regulator's report stated: "Our investigation found that the programme's lack of disclosure that the narrator's parent occupied a position in the Hamas-controlled authority was significantly deceptive.
"It meant that the public did not have critical information which may have been very significant to their evaluation of the voice and the details he presented.
"Trust is at the center of the connection between a television network and its viewers, especially for a national broadcasting corporation such as the British Broadcasting Corporation.
"This error had the risk to damage the very considerable amounts of confidence that the public would have put in a documentary produced by the BBC about the Gaza conflict."
The documentary was pulled from iPlayer in February after the presenter's personal associations emerged, and in the month of July an broadcaster's internal assessment concluded it breached the broadcaster's editorial guidelines on factual correctness.
A corporation official stated: "The authority's determination is in agreement with the results of the corporation's inquiry, that there was a significant failing in the documentary in relation to the corporation's content standards on accuracy, which reflects clause 2.2 of the regulator's media standards.
"We expressed regret for this and we agree with Ofcom's decision in its entirety. We will comply with the penalty as soon as the schedule and language are confirmed."