🔗 Share this article BBC Gaza Programme Considered a 'Significant' Violation of Broadcasting Standards, Says Ofcom The BBC engaged in a "major breach" of industry standards by not revealing that the narrator of a film about the Gaza situation was the offspring of a Hamas official, according to British broadcasting authority Ofcom. An inquiry by the broadcasting watchdog into the programme Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has concluded that the film was "significantly deceptive". The chief executive of the broadcaster had already issued an apology, stating there had been "a major oversight in relation to factual correctness". The regulator has directed the BBC to transmit a prime-time announcement about its decisions. "Since this amounts to a serious breach of our rules, we are directing the broadcaster to broadcast a announcement of our conclusions against it on the BBC's second channel at 9pm, with a date to be determined," it said. 'Potential to Damage Credibility' The regulator's announcement stated: "Our probe found that the film's failure to disclose that the narrator's parent held a role in the Hamas-administered administration was significantly deceptive. "Consequently that the viewers did not have critical information which may have been highly relevant to their assessment of the narrator and the details he provided. "Trust is at the core of the relationship between a television network and its audience, notably for a public service broadcaster such as the British Broadcasting Corporation. "This oversight had the potential to erode the exceptionally strong levels of trust that the public would have put in a factual film from the broadcaster about the Gaza conflict." The programme was withdrawn from iPlayer in last February after the narrator's personal associations emerged, and in the month of July an corporation's own inquiry concluded it breached the organization's editorial guidelines on truthfulness. A corporation official said: "The regulator's decision is in line with the findings of Peter Johnston's review, that there was a significant failing in the film in relation to the broadcaster's journalistic policies on accuracy, which reflects regulation 2.2 of Ofcom's Broadcasting Code. "We issued an apology for this and we accept the authority's determination in its entirety. We will comply with the sanction as soon as the timing and wording are confirmed."