British Broadcasting Corporation Gaza Film Considered a 'Serious' Violation of Broadcasting Standards, Declares Broadcasting Watchdog
The public service broadcaster was found to have committed a "significant breach" of industry standards by failing to disclose that the voice of a documentary about the Gaza conflict was the child of a Hamas administrator, according to UK media regulator Ofcom.
An investigation by the media regulator into the documentary titled Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has found that the programme was "substantially inaccurate".
The BBC's director general had previously apologised, noting there had been "a significant failing in relation to accuracy".
The authority has instructed the broadcaster to air a prime-time announcement about its conclusions.
"As this represents a significant violation of our rules, we are directing the broadcaster to air a statement of our determinations against it on BBC Two at 21:00, with a schedule to be determined," it said.
'Risk to Erode Trust'
The watchdog's statement said: "The inquiry we conducted found that the film's failure to disclose that the narrator's father served in a position in the Hamas-administered authority was materially misleading.
"It meant that the public did not have vital facts which may have been extremely pertinent to their judgment of the presenter and the content he provided.
"Confidence is at the core of the bond between a television network and its viewers, particularly for a national broadcasting corporation such as the British Broadcasting Corporation.
"This failing had the potential to damage the very considerable degrees of confidence that the public would have invested in a factual film from the broadcaster about the Gaza conflict."
The film was withdrawn from the online platform in last February after the presenter's family links came to light, and in this past July an broadcaster's internal assessment concluded it violated the broadcaster's journalistic standards on truthfulness.
A representative for the broadcaster stated: "The Ofcom ruling is in accordance with the results of Peter Johnston's review, that there was a major oversight in the film in relation to the broadcaster's journalistic policies on factual correctness, which corresponds to clause 2.2 of the regulator's media standards.
"We have apologised for this and we accept the regulator's ruling in its entirety. We will comply with the directive as soon as the timing and language are finalised."
