đź”— Share this article BBC Gaza Documentary Deemed a 'Significant' Infringement of Broadcasting Regulations, Declares Broadcasting Watchdog The BBC was found to have committed a "significant breach" of industry standards by not revealing that the presenter of a film about Gaza was the offspring of a Hamas official, as ruled by British broadcasting authority Ofcom. An investigation by the media regulator into Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has concluded that the film was "materially misleading". The BBC's director general had previously apologised, saying there had been "a significant failing in relation to accuracy". Ofcom has ordered the BBC to air a evening announcement about its decisions. "Given this constitutes a major infringement of our rules, we are ordering the broadcaster to transmit a message of our findings against it on BBC2 at 9pm, with a schedule to be determined," the regulator stated. 'Possibility to Erode Confidence' The watchdog's statement said: "Our probe found that the documentary's omission to reveal that the narrator's parent held a post in the Hamas-run authority was substantially inaccurate. "This implied that the public did not have critical information which may have been highly relevant to their assessment of the narrator and the content he presented. "Trust is at the core of the connection between a media organization and its viewers, especially for a national broadcasting corporation such as the public broadcaster. "This failing had the possibility to undermine the very considerable amounts of credibility that the public would have invested in a documentary produced by the BBC about the Israel-Gaza war." The programme was removed from iPlayer in February after the presenter's familial connections emerged, and in July an broadcaster's internal assessment concluded it breached the broadcaster's editorial guidelines on truthfulness. A BBC spokesperson said: "The authority's determination is in agreement with the findings of the corporation's inquiry, that there was a significant failing in the programme in relation to the corporation's content standards on accuracy, which reflects regulation 2.2 of Ofcom's Broadcasting Code. "We expressed regret for this and we agree with Ofcom's decision in its entirety. We will follow the penalty as soon as the schedule and wording are confirmed."