BBC Gaza Programme Deemed a 'Major' Breach of Broadcasting Rules, Says Ofcom

The BBC committed a "major breach" of industry standards by not revealing that the narrator of a film about the Gaza conflict was the child of a Hamas administrator, as ruled by British broadcasting authority Ofcom.

An inquiry by the broadcasting watchdog into Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has determined that the programme was "substantially inaccurate".

The chief executive of the broadcaster had previously apologised, saying there had been "a serious error in relation to factual correctness".

The regulator has directed the corporation to air a peak-time announcement about its findings.

"As this represents a major infringement of our regulations, we are instructing the corporation to air a announcement of our determinations against it on the BBC's second channel at 9pm, with a timing to be finalised," the statement read.

'Potential to Erode Trust'

The regulator's report declared: "Our investigation concluded that the programme's lack of disclosure that the voice's father occupied a position in the Hamas-controlled government was materially misleading.

"Consequently that the public did not have critical information which may have been extremely pertinent to their judgment of the voice and the content he presented.

"Credibility is at the core of the relationship between a broadcaster and its audience, particularly for a national broadcasting corporation such as the BBC.

"This error had the risk to erode the significantly high levels of confidence that viewers would have put in a factual film from the broadcaster about the Gaza conflict."

The film was removed from the BBC's streaming service in the month of February after the presenter's family links emerged, and in July an internal BBC review determined it breached the organization's content policies on factual correctness.

A BBC spokesperson stated: "The regulator's decision is in accordance with the conclusions of Peter Johnston's review, that there was a serious error in the programme in relation to the BBC's Editorial Guidelines on accuracy, which aligns with clause 2.2 of the regulator's media standards.

"We have apologised for this and we accept Ofcom's decision in its entirety. We will adhere to the penalty as soon as the timing and wording are finalised."