🔗 Share this article BBC Gaza Film Deemed a 'Significant' Infringement of Media Rules, States Broadcasting Watchdog The BBC was found to have committed a "major breach" of broadcasting rules by omitting to mention that the voice of a film about the Gaza situation was the child of a Hamas representative, according to UK media regulator Ofcom. An investigation by the broadcasting watchdog into the programme Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has determined that the documentary was "materially misleading". The BBC's director general had earlier expressed regret, stating there had been "a major oversight in relation to truthfulness". The authority has ordered the broadcaster to transmit a prime-time declaration about its decisions. "Since this amounts to a major infringement of our rules, we are instructing the corporation to air a announcement of our findings against it on the BBC's second channel at 9pm, with a schedule to be finalised," it said. 'Potential to Erode Trust' The regulator's report said: "Our probe concluded that the documentary's failure to disclose that the presenter's father served in a position in the Hamas-controlled government was materially misleading. "This implied that the public did not have critical information which may have been highly relevant to their assessment of the narrator and the details he presented. "Confidence is at the core of the connection between a television network and its viewers, especially for a public service broadcaster such as the public broadcaster. "This error had the possibility to erode the exceptionally strong levels of trust that viewers would have put in a factual film from the broadcaster about the conflict in Gaza." The film was pulled from the online platform in last February after the narrator's personal associations came to light, and in July an internal BBC review determined it breached the corporation's journalistic standards on accuracy. A BBC spokesperson stated: "The Ofcom ruling is in agreement with the results of the corporation's inquiry, that there was a significant failing in the documentary in relation to the BBC's Editorial Guidelines on truthfulness, which corresponds to regulation 2.2 of the regulator's media standards. "We issued an apology for this and we agree with the authority's determination in its entirety. We will follow the sanction as soon as the timing and language are finalised."