🔗 Share this article BBC Gaza Film Considered a 'Significant' Infringement of Media Standards, Says Broadcasting Watchdog The British broadcaster committed a "significant breach" of industry standards by not revealing that the presenter of a documentary about the Gaza situation was the child of a Hamas official, as ruled by UK media regulator Ofcom. An probe by the media regulator into the programme Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has concluded that the documentary was "substantially inaccurate". The head of the BBC had previously apologised, stating there had been "a significant failing in relation to accuracy". Ofcom has ordered the broadcaster to air a prime-time declaration about its conclusions. "Given this constitutes a major infringement of our code, we are directing the broadcaster to transmit a announcement of our determinations against it on the BBC's second channel at 9pm, with a date to be finalised," it said. 'Potential to Undermine Trust' The authority's announcement declared: "Our investigation found that the film's lack of disclosure that the narrator's father occupied a post in the Hamas-run administration was substantially inaccurate. "Consequently that the audience did not have critical information which may have been very significant to their judgment of the voice and the information he shared. "Trust is at the center of the bond between a television network and its viewers, particularly for a public service broadcaster such as the BBC. "This failing had the potential to erode the exceptionally strong levels of credibility that viewers would have placed in a BBC factual programme about the Gaza conflict." The documentary was pulled from the online platform in February after the boy's family links came to light, and in July an internal BBC review determined it violated the broadcaster's journalistic standards on truthfulness. A BBC spokesperson stated: "The authority's determination is in accordance with the findings of the internal assessment, that there was a significant failing in the programme in relation to the BBC's Editorial Guidelines on factual correctness, which corresponds to regulation 2.2 of Ofcom's Broadcasting Code. "We issued an apology for this and we agree with the regulator's ruling in full. We will comply with the directive as soon as the date and language are confirmed."