BBC Gaza Film Ruled a 'Significant' Breach of Media Standards, Says Ofcom

The public service broadcaster committed a "serious breach" of broadcasting rules by not revealing that the voice of a film about Gaza was the child of a Hamas representative, as determined by UK media regulator Ofcom.

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

The head of the BBC had previously apologised, saying there had been "a significant failing in relation to truthfulness".

Ofcom has directed the BBC to transmit a evening declaration about its findings.

"Given this constitutes a serious breach of our code, we are ordering the corporation to transmit a statement of our findings against it on BBC2 at 9pm, with a timing to be confirmed," it said.

'Possibility to Undermine Credibility'

The regulator's report stated: "The inquiry we conducted concluded that the film's failure to disclose that the narrator's father served in a position in the Hamas-controlled administration was materially misleading.

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

"Confidence is at the center of the bond between a television network and its public, particularly for a public service broadcaster such as the British Broadcasting Corporation.

"This error had the risk to undermine the exceptionally strong degrees of credibility that viewers would have invested in a BBC factual programme about the Israel-Gaza war."

The programme was pulled from the BBC's streaming service in the month of February after the presenter's family links came to light, and in July an corporation's own inquiry found it violated the broadcaster's journalistic standards on accuracy.

A corporation official commented: "The Ofcom ruling is in agreement with the findings of the corporation's inquiry, that there was a major oversight in the documentary in relation to the broadcaster's journalistic policies on factual correctness, which corresponds to Rule 2.2 of the authority's broadcasting regulations.

"We expressed regret for this and we accept the regulator's ruling in complete. We will adhere to the directive as soon as the timing and wording are determined."