BBC Gaza Documentary Considered a 'Significant' Violation of Broadcasting Standards, States UK Media Regulator

The BBC was found to have committed a "major breach" of media regulations by not revealing that the presenter of a programme about the Gaza conflict was the offspring of a Hamas official, as determined by British broadcasting authority Ofcom.

An investigation by the broadcasting watchdog into Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has found that the film was "materially misleading".

The chief executive of the broadcaster had previously apologised, stating there had been "a major oversight in relation to accuracy".

The authority has instructed the BBC to transmit a evening statement about its conclusions.

"Since this amounts to a major infringement of our regulations, we are directing the broadcaster to air a statement of our conclusions against it on BBC2 at 21:00, with a schedule to be confirmed," the statement read.

'Risk to Damage Confidence'

The regulator's statement declared: "Our investigation concluded that the documentary's omission to reveal that the narrator's father served in a post in the Hamas-run authority was significantly deceptive.

"This implied that the public did not have critical information which may have been very significant to their judgment of the voice and the details he provided.

"Confidence is at the center of the relationship between a broadcaster and its audience, notably for a national broadcasting corporation such as the public broadcaster.

"This failing had the risk to damage the significantly high amounts of trust that audiences would have placed in a BBC factual programme about the Israel-Gaza war."

The programme was pulled from iPlayer in the month of February after the boy's family links came to light, and in the month of July an broadcaster's internal assessment concluded it breached the broadcaster's editorial guidelines on accuracy.

A BBC spokesperson commented: "The regulator's decision is in agreement with the findings of the corporation's inquiry, that there was a significant failing in the film in relation to the corporation's content standards on truthfulness, which corresponds to regulation 2.2 of the authority's broadcasting regulations.

"We have apologised for this and we agree with Ofcom's decision in its entirety. We will comply with the directive as soon as the schedule and wording are finalised."