British Broadcasting Corporation Gaza Film Deemed a 'Significant' Breach of Broadcasting Rules, Declares Ofcom

The public service broadcaster committed a "serious breach" of media regulations by not revealing that the voice of a programme about Gaza was the child of a Hamas official, as determined by regulatory body Ofcom.

An inquiry by the media regulator into the documentary titled Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has concluded that the film was "substantially inaccurate".

The chief executive of the broadcaster had earlier expressed regret, saying there had been "a significant failing in relation to accuracy".

The regulator has instructed the broadcaster to transmit a peak-time statement about its findings.

"As this represents a serious breach of our code, we are directing the broadcaster to air a message of our determinations against it on BBC Two at 21:00, with a date to be determined," the statement read.

'Potential to Damage Confidence'

The watchdog's statement said: "Our investigation concluded that the documentary's omission to reveal that the presenter's male guardian held a role in the Hamas-administered administration was significantly deceptive.

"This implied that the public did not have vital facts which may have been very significant to their judgment of the voice and the details he presented.

"Trust is at the heart of the connection between a media organization and its audience, particularly for a state-funded media outlet such as the British Broadcasting Corporation.

"This oversight had the risk to damage the significantly high amounts of confidence that the public would have placed in a factual film from the broadcaster about the Israel-Gaza war."

The film was pulled from iPlayer in last February after the boy's familial connections emerged, and in July an internal BBC review concluded it violated the organization's journalistic standards on factual correctness.

A corporation official stated: "The Ofcom ruling is in agreement with the findings of the corporation's inquiry, that there was a major oversight in the programme in relation to the broadcaster's journalistic policies on factual correctness, which corresponds to regulation 2.2 of the regulator's media standards.

"We have apologised for this and we accept Ofcom's decision in complete. We will follow the directive as soon as the date and wording are finalised."