🔗 Share this article British Broadcasting Corporation Gaza Programme Considered a 'Serious' Infringement of Media Regulations, States Ofcom The British broadcaster was found to have committed a "significant breach" of media regulations by not revealing that the narrator of a film about the Gaza conflict was the son of a Hamas administrator, according to UK media regulator Ofcom. An probe by the broadcasting watchdog into Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has determined that the programme was "significantly deceptive". The head of the BBC had earlier expressed regret, stating there had been "a significant failing in relation to accuracy". The regulator has ordered the BBC to air a peak-time announcement about its findings. "Given this constitutes a serious breach of our rules, we are directing the corporation to broadcast a statement of our findings against it on BBC2 at 9pm, with a schedule to be determined," the regulator stated. 'Possibility to Undermine Trust' The authority's announcement declared: "Our investigation found that the documentary's omission to reveal that the presenter's father served in a post in the Hamas-run authority was substantially inaccurate. "This implied that the public did not have essential details which may have been highly relevant to their assessment of the voice and the information he provided. "Trust is at the heart of the connection between a broadcaster and its audience, especially for a state-funded media outlet such as the BBC. "This error had the potential to erode the exceptionally strong amounts of credibility that viewers would have invested in a documentary produced by the BBC about the Gaza conflict." The film was pulled from the online platform in February after the boy's familial connections came to light, and in July an corporation's own inquiry determined it infringed the organization's editorial guidelines on truthfulness. A BBC spokesperson stated: "The authority's determination is in agreement with the results of the corporation's inquiry, that there was a serious error in the programme in relation to the corporation's content standards on factual correctness, which aligns with clause 2.2 of the regulator's media standards. "We expressed regret for this and we accept Ofcom's decision in full. We will adhere to the penalty as soon as the date and language are determined."