BBC Gaza Documentary Ruled a 'Major' Violation of Media Rules, Says Ofcom

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

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

The head of the BBC had previously apologised, noting there had been "a major oversight in relation to truthfulness".

Ofcom has ordered the corporation to air a peak-time statement about its decisions.

"As this represents a major infringement of our regulations, we are ordering the corporation to transmit a announcement of our findings against it on BBC2 at 21:00, with a date to be finalised," it said.

'Possibility to Erode Confidence'

The regulator's statement said: "Our investigation found that the programme's failure to disclose that the voice's father occupied a role in the Hamas-run government was significantly deceptive.

"This implied that the audience did not have essential details which may have been very significant to their judgment of the voice and the details he shared.

"Confidence is at the center of the relationship between a television network and its audience, especially for a national broadcasting corporation such as the British Broadcasting Corporation.

"This error had the potential to damage the exceptionally strong amounts of trust that viewers would have placed in a factual film from the broadcaster about the Gaza conflict."

The programme was withdrawn from iPlayer in last February after the boy's personal associations were revealed, and in July an internal BBC review determined it infringed the organization's content policies on accuracy.

A corporation official said: "The regulator's decision is in line with the conclusions of Peter Johnston's review, that there was a significant failing in the programme in relation to the broadcaster's journalistic policies on accuracy, which reflects Rule 2.2 of the authority's broadcasting regulations.

"We issued an apology for this and we accept the authority's determination in its entirety. We will comply with the directive as soon as the schedule and wording are finalised."