BBC Gaza Film Considered a 'Serious' Violation of Media Regulations, Says Ofcom

The British broadcaster engaged in a "significant breach" of industry standards by failing to disclose that the narrator of a programme about Gaza was the offspring of a Hamas official, as determined by British broadcasting authority Ofcom.

An probe by Ofcom into the documentary titled Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has concluded that the film was "significantly deceptive".

The chief executive of the broadcaster had already issued an apology, saying there had been "a major oversight in relation to accuracy".

The authority has directed the BBC to broadcast a evening declaration about its findings.

"As this represents a serious breach of our code, we are instructing the BBC to transmit a announcement of our findings against it on BBC2 at 21:00, with a timing to be confirmed," the regulator stated.

'Possibility to Damage Trust'

The watchdog's report said: "Our probe concluded that the documentary's failure to disclose that the voice's father served in a post in the Hamas-administered authority was materially misleading.

"It meant that the audience did not have essential details which may have been highly relevant 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 viewers, particularly for a national broadcasting corporation such as the BBC.

"This failing had the potential to damage the very considerable degrees of credibility that audiences would have put in a factual film from the broadcaster about the Israel-Gaza war."

The programme was pulled from iPlayer in last February after the narrator's family links were revealed, and in the month of July an corporation's own inquiry concluded it violated the organization's journalistic standards on accuracy.

A corporation official stated: "The authority's determination is in agreement with the results of the internal assessment, that there was a serious error in the documentary in relation to the broadcaster's journalistic policies on truthfulness, which corresponds to clause 2.2 of the authority's broadcasting regulations.

"We expressed regret for this and we accept the authority's determination in its entirety. We will comply with the directive as soon as the date and language are determined."