British Broadcasting Corporation Gaza Documentary Deemed a 'Significant' Violation of Broadcasting Standards, Says Ofcom

The BBC was found to have committed a "significant breach" of media regulations by omitting to mention that the presenter of a programme about the Gaza conflict was the child of a Hamas administrator, as determined by UK media regulator Ofcom.

An investigation by the broadcasting watchdog into Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has found that the documentary was "significantly deceptive".

The chief executive of the broadcaster had earlier expressed regret, noting there had been "a major oversight in relation to factual correctness".

The authority has ordered the BBC to transmit a peak-time announcement about its findings.

"Given this constitutes a significant violation of our regulations, we are instructing the corporation to transmit a statement of our determinations against it on the BBC's second channel at 9pm, with a date to be confirmed," it said.

'Risk to Undermine Trust'

The watchdog's announcement stated: "Our probe determined that the programme's failure to disclose that the voice's father held a post in the Hamas-administered administration was significantly deceptive.

"It meant that the audience did not have essential details which may have been extremely pertinent to their evaluation of the presenter and the details he provided.

"Confidence is at the heart of the connection between a broadcaster and its public, notably for a public service broadcaster such as the British Broadcasting Corporation.

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

The programme was pulled from the online platform in February after the boy's family links were revealed, and in this past July an corporation's own inquiry concluded it infringed the broadcaster's content policies on factual correctness.

A representative for the broadcaster stated: "The authority's determination is in agreement with the findings of Peter Johnston's review, that there was a significant failing in the programme in relation to the broadcaster's journalistic policies on factual correctness, which corresponds to Rule 2.2 of the regulator's media standards.

"We issued an apology for this and we comply with Ofcom's decision in complete. We will comply with the sanction as soon as the date and wording are confirmed."