British Broadcasting Corporation Gaza Film Considered a 'Significant' Infringement of Media Rules, Says Ofcom

The British broadcaster committed a "significant breach" of industry standards by not revealing that the voice of a film about the Gaza conflict was the son of a Hamas representative, as determined by British broadcasting authority Ofcom.

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

The head of the BBC had earlier expressed regret, saying there had been "a significant failing in relation to truthfulness".

Ofcom has instructed the BBC to air a prime-time statement about its decisions.

"As this represents a significant violation of our regulations, we are directing the broadcaster to transmit a message of our determinations against it on the BBC's second channel at 9pm, with a timing to be finalised," it said.

'Risk to Damage Credibility'

The watchdog's report declared: "Our investigation determined that the film's failure to disclose that the voice's parent held a role in the Hamas-run authority was significantly deceptive.

"It meant that the public did not have critical information which may have been extremely pertinent to their judgment of the narrator and the content he shared.

"Credibility is at the core of the connection between a broadcaster and its public, particularly for a state-funded media outlet such as the public broadcaster.

"This oversight had the potential to erode the significantly high amounts of credibility that the public would have put in a factual film from the broadcaster about the conflict in Gaza."

The programme was withdrawn from the online platform in the month of February after the boy's personal associations were revealed, and in the month of July an broadcaster's internal assessment concluded it breached the organization's content policies on truthfulness.

A representative for the broadcaster commented: "The authority's determination is in agreement with the conclusions of the internal assessment, that there was a major oversight in the programme in relation to the BBC's Editorial Guidelines on factual correctness, which reflects clause 2.2 of Ofcom's Broadcasting Code.

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