BBC Gaza Documentary Considered a 'Serious' Infringement of Media Regulations, States UK Media Regulator
The British broadcaster committed a "major breach" of industry standards by omitting to mention that the presenter of a programme about the Gaza conflict was the son of a Hamas administrator, according to British broadcasting authority Ofcom.
An investigation by the media regulator into the documentary titled Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has found that the documentary was "materially misleading".
The head of the BBC had earlier expressed regret, stating there had been "a significant failing in relation to factual correctness".
The authority has directed the BBC to broadcast a prime-time statement about its decisions.
"Since this amounts to a serious breach of our code, we are instructing the corporation to air a message of our findings against it on BBC2 at 9pm, with a timing to be determined," the regulator stated.
'Possibility to Damage Credibility'
The regulator's statement stated: "The inquiry we conducted determined that the documentary's omission to reveal that the narrator's male guardian occupied a position in the Hamas-controlled government was significantly deceptive.
"This implied that the public did not have vital facts which may have been very significant to their judgment of the narrator and the information he provided.
"Trust is at the center of the relationship between a media organization and its audience, notably for a national broadcasting corporation such as the public broadcaster.
"This error had the potential to damage the exceptionally strong degrees of confidence that viewers would have put in a BBC factual programme about the Gaza conflict."
The programme was withdrawn from the online platform in February after the presenter's personal associations came to light, and in this past July an corporation's own inquiry found it violated the broadcaster's editorial guidelines on truthfulness.
A corporation official stated: "The regulator's decision is in accordance with the results of Peter Johnston's review, that there was a significant failing in the film in relation to the BBC's Editorial Guidelines on factual correctness, which corresponds to clause 2.2 of Ofcom's Broadcasting Code.
"We have apologised for this and we accept Ofcom's decision in full. We will comply with the penalty as soon as the date and wording are finalised."
