🔗 Share this article British Broadcasting Corporation Gaza Documentary Ruled a 'Significant' Violation of Media Regulations, Says Broadcasting Watchdog The public service broadcaster engaged in a "significant breach" of media regulations by not revealing that the voice of a film about the Gaza situation was the offspring of a Hamas administrator, according to British broadcasting authority Ofcom. An investigation by the media regulator into the documentary titled 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 major oversight in relation to accuracy". Ofcom has instructed the BBC to broadcast a evening announcement about its decisions. "Since this amounts to a serious breach of our code, we are directing the broadcaster to transmit a announcement of our findings against it on the BBC's second channel at 21:00, with a date to be finalised," it said. 'Risk to Damage Trust' The authority's announcement said: "The inquiry we conducted determined that the programme's lack of disclosure that the narrator's parent occupied a post in the Hamas-administered government was substantially inaccurate. "This implied that the viewers did not have essential details which may have been extremely pertinent to their evaluation of the narrator and the information he provided. "Credibility is at the core of the bond between a media organization and its viewers, especially for a public service broadcaster such as the British Broadcasting Corporation. "This oversight had the possibility to erode the very considerable degrees of confidence that viewers would have put in a factual film from the broadcaster about the conflict in Gaza." The documentary was removed from iPlayer in the month of February after the presenter's personal associations came to light, and in the month of July an internal BBC review found it violated the corporation's editorial guidelines on accuracy. A corporation official commented: "The regulator's decision is in accordance with the conclusions of the corporation's inquiry, that there was a major oversight in the documentary in relation to the BBC's Editorial Guidelines on factual correctness, which reflects clause 2.2 of Ofcom's Broadcasting Code. "We issued an apology for this and we agree with the authority's determination in full. We will adhere to the sanction as soon as the timing and wording are confirmed."