🔗 Share this article BBC Gaza Programme Considered a 'Significant' Infringement of Media Regulations, Declares Ofcom The public service broadcaster engaged in a "significant breach" of media regulations by omitting to mention that the voice of a film about the Gaza conflict was the son of a Hamas administrator, according to British broadcasting authority Ofcom. An investigation by the media regulator into Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has concluded that the film was "substantially inaccurate". The head of the BBC had already issued an apology, saying there had been "a serious error in relation to factual correctness". The authority has ordered the corporation to broadcast a peak-time announcement about its conclusions. "As this represents a significant violation of our code, we are ordering the broadcaster to transmit a statement of our conclusions against it on BBC Two at nine o'clock in the evening, with a schedule to be determined," it said. 'Possibility to Damage Credibility' The watchdog's report stated: "Our probe found that the film's failure to disclose that the voice's father served in a post in the Hamas-controlled authority was significantly deceptive. "Consequently that the audience did not have vital facts which may have been extremely pertinent to their judgment of the presenter and the information he provided. "Confidence is at the heart of the bond between a broadcaster and its viewers, particularly for a national broadcasting corporation such as the BBC. "This oversight had the risk to undermine the significantly high amounts of confidence that the public would have invested in a documentary produced by the BBC about the conflict in Gaza." The film was pulled from iPlayer in last February after the narrator's familial connections came to light, and in the month of July an corporation's own inquiry concluded it violated the corporation's content policies on accuracy. A representative for the broadcaster commented: "The authority's determination is in line with the conclusions of Peter Johnston's review, that there was a major oversight in the documentary in relation to the broadcaster's journalistic policies on truthfulness, which reflects regulation 2.2 of Ofcom's Broadcasting Code. "We have apologised for this and we accept Ofcom's decision in its entirety. We will adhere to the penalty as soon as the timing and wording are finalised."