🔗 Share this article BBC Gaza Documentary Deemed a 'Major' Infringement of Media Regulations, Says UK Media Regulator The British broadcaster engaged in a "significant breach" of industry standards by not revealing that the voice of a film about the Gaza conflict was the child of a Hamas representative, as ruled by regulatory body Ofcom. An inquiry by the broadcasting watchdog into Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has found that the documentary was "materially misleading". The head of the BBC had previously apologised, noting there had been "a serious error in relation to accuracy". The authority has ordered the corporation to broadcast a prime-time statement about its conclusions. "As this represents a significant violation of our regulations, we are ordering the broadcaster to transmit a message of our determinations against it on BBC2 at 21:00, with a date to be finalised," the regulator stated. 'Possibility to Erode Credibility' The watchdog's announcement stated: "Our probe concluded that the documentary's failure to disclose that the presenter's male guardian held a position in the Hamas-run administration was substantially inaccurate. "Consequently that the public did not have essential details which may have been extremely pertinent to their assessment of the presenter and the content he presented. "Confidence is at the center of the connection between a media organization and its public, particularly for a public service broadcaster such as the BBC. "This error had the potential to undermine the significantly high amounts of credibility that the public would have invested in a documentary produced by the BBC about the conflict in Gaza." The documentary was pulled from iPlayer in February after the presenter's family links were revealed, and in July an internal BBC review concluded it breached the corporation's journalistic standards on factual correctness. A corporation official commented: "The Ofcom ruling is in line with the findings of the corporation's inquiry, that there was a significant failing in the documentary in relation to the corporation's content standards on accuracy, which aligns with Rule 2.2 of the regulator's media standards. "We have apologised for this and we accept Ofcom's decision in full. We will comply with the directive as soon as the timing and wording are determined."