BBC Gaza Film Considered a 'Serious' Violation of Broadcasting Regulations, Declares Broadcasting Watchdog

The British broadcaster committed a "serious breach" of media regulations by omitting to mention that the narrator of a documentary about Gaza was the son of a Hamas representative, as determined by regulatory body Ofcom.

An inquiry by Ofcom into the programme Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has determined that the programme was "materially misleading".

The chief executive of the broadcaster had already issued an apology, noting there had been "a serious error in relation to accuracy".

The authority has directed the corporation to transmit a evening declaration about its decisions.

"As this represents a serious breach of our regulations, we are ordering the corporation to air a announcement of our conclusions against it on BBC Two at 9pm, with a timing to be confirmed," the statement read.

'Potential to Undermine Credibility'

The authority's statement said: "The inquiry we conducted found that the programme's failure to disclose that the presenter's male guardian occupied a position in the Hamas-controlled authority was materially misleading.

"Consequently that the public did not have critical information which may have been highly relevant to their judgment of the narrator and the details he shared.

"Confidence is at the heart of the relationship between a media organization and its viewers, particularly for a state-funded media outlet such as the BBC.

"This error had the possibility to undermine the exceptionally strong levels of trust that the public would have put in a documentary produced by the BBC about the Israel-Gaza war."

The programme was removed from the online platform in last February after the boy's personal associations emerged, and in the month of July an internal BBC review found it breached the organization's editorial guidelines on accuracy.

A corporation official said: "The Ofcom ruling is in agreement with the results of the internal assessment, that there was a serious error in the documentary in relation to the corporation's content standards on accuracy, which reflects regulation 2.2 of the regulator's media standards.

"We issued an apology for this and we comply with the authority's determination in complete. We will adhere to the sanction as soon as the date and wording are finalised."