British Broadcasting Corporation Gaza Programme Ruled a 'Major' Violation of Broadcasting Standards, Says Broadcasting Watchdog
The BBC was found to have committed a "serious breach" of broadcasting rules by omitting to mention that the voice of a programme about the Gaza situation was the son of a Hamas representative, as determined by British broadcasting authority Ofcom.
An inquiry by the broadcasting watchdog into the documentary titled Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has found that the film was "materially misleading".
The chief executive of the broadcaster had previously apologised, saying there had been "a significant failing in relation to factual correctness".
The authority has directed the broadcaster to transmit a evening announcement about its conclusions.
"Since this amounts to a significant violation of our rules, we are directing the corporation to air a statement of our determinations against it on the BBC's second channel at 9pm, with a timing to be determined," the statement read.
'Risk to Erode Credibility'
The authority's report stated: "The inquiry we conducted concluded that the film's lack of disclosure that the narrator's father served in a post in the Hamas-run administration was substantially inaccurate.
"Consequently that the public did not have vital facts which may have been highly relevant to their judgment of the voice and the information he provided.
"Confidence is at the core of the connection between a television network and its public, particularly for a national broadcasting corporation such as the BBC.
"This failing had the risk to undermine the exceptionally strong levels of trust that the public would have put in a BBC factual programme about the conflict in Gaza."
The programme was withdrawn from iPlayer in last February after the presenter's familial connections were revealed, and in the month of July an corporation's own inquiry determined it violated the broadcaster's journalistic standards on accuracy.
A BBC spokesperson said: "The regulator's decision is in accordance with the conclusions of Peter Johnston's review, that there was a major oversight in the documentary in relation to the broadcaster's journalistic policies on accuracy, which corresponds to Rule 2.2 of Ofcom's Broadcasting Code.
"We have apologised for this and we comply with Ofcom's decision in complete. We will follow the directive as soon as the timing and wording are confirmed."
