Three days after airing a documentary about the lives of children and teenagers in Gaza, the BBC has apologized, admitting it was unaware that one of the film’s protagonists is the son of a senior Hamas official and failed to disclose this to viewers.
The teenager, identified as Abdullah al-Yazouri, was named by independent journalist David Collier, who shared his findings on X.
According to Collier, al-Yazouri also appeared in a Channel 4 News report last November under the name Abdullah Abu Shamala.
Collier disclosed that 14-year-old Abdullah, who narrates the documentary in his own voice, is the son of Ayman al-Yazouri, a high-ranking Hamas official currently serving as the group’s agriculture minister which was not mentioned in the BBC’s documentary “Gaza: How to Survive a War Zone.”
The film, directed by Jamie Roberts and Yusuf Hammash, aired Monday on BBC Two.
It follows the lives of four young Gazans during the ongoing war with Israel.
The directors were not present in Gaza during filming; instead, they coordinated remotely with local Palestinian videographers and crew members.
In a statement issued, the BBC said that since the documentary aired three days ago, it had “become aware of the family connections of the film’s narrator, a child called Abdullah.”
“We’ve promised our audiences the highest standards of transparency, so it is only right that as a result of this new information, we add some more detail to the film before its retransmission,” the statement continued. “We apologize for the omission of that detail from the original film.”
For future broadcasts and availability on iPlayer, the film will now clarify: “The narrator of this film is 13-year-old Abdullah. His father has worked as a deputy agriculture minister for the Hamas-run government in Gaza. The production team had full editorial control of filming with Abdullah.”
The statement has been added to the BBC’s Corrections and Clarifications page, and the broadcaster said it will also issue a direct response to the letter. [BBC]
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