Media watchdog Ofcom has concluded the BBC committed “significant editorial failings” in its reporting of an antisemitic attack on Jewish students travelling on a bus in London.

The body said its investigation found the broadcaster failed to observe its editorial guidelines to report news with “due accuracy and due impartiality”.

The incident on November 29 2021 saw a group of about 40 young Jewish people aboard a Hanukkah party bus in London’s Oxford Street attacked by a group of men who swore, made obscene gestures and threw a shopping basket at them.

In its coverage, the BBC reported that an anti-Muslim slur had been heard from inside the bus.

Following BBC coverage on December 2, the Board of Deputies of British Jews and the Chief Rabbi were among a significant number of groups and individuals who complained to the broadcaster about the accuracy and impartiality of the coverage.

Ofcom said in a statement: “Our investigation uncovered significant editorial failings in the BBC’s reporting of an antisemitic attack on Jewish students travelling on board a bus in London.

“The BBC’s reports claimed that an audio recording made during the incident included anti-Muslim slurs – which it later changed to the singular ‘slur’ – which came from inside the bus. Shortly afterwards, it received evidence which disputed this interpretation of the audio.

“The BBC failed to promptly acknowledge that the audio was disputed and did not update its online news article to reflect this for almost eight weeks. During this time the BBC was aware that the article’s content was causing significant distress and anxiety to the victims of the attack and the wider Jewish community.

“This, in our opinion, was a significant failure to observe its editorial guidelines to report news with due accuracy and due impartiality.”

Ofcom said it had also investigated a connected report broadcast on BBC London News, concluding that “at the time it was broadcast and for the 24-hour period it was available on the BBC iPlayer, the programme did not breach our rules”.

It added: “That said, the BBC made a serious editorial misjudgment by not reporting on air, at any point, that the claim it had made about anti-Muslim slurs was disputed, once new evidence emerged.”

The watchdog said the BBC’s “failure to respond promptly and transparently created an impression of defensiveness by the BBC among the Jewish community”.

Ofcom said the BBC has “further to go” in learning how to responding to critiques of its reporting.

It will also review how the broadcaster addressed the complaint, handling and transparency issues raised by the incident.

A spokesperson for the Campaign Against Antisemitism said: “Almost a year after the BBC’s abominable coverage of an antisemitic incident on Oxford Street, Ofcom has seen what every viewer and reader of the BBC’s coverage could but which the BBC itself refused to accept: its reportage added insult to the injury already inflicted on the victims and the Jewish community, and abysmally failed to meet the most basic editorial standards.

“Ofcom’s decision today begins to undo that insult.

“Sadly, the BBC’s stonewalling is exactly what British Jews have come to expect from our public broadcaster.

“Now that Ofcom has warned the BBC after the BBC disgracefully failed to uphold our complaints against it, it has become clear as day that a Parliamentary inquiry into the BBC focusing on its coverage of issues relating to Jews is warranted, and we have joined the Jewish Chronicle and others calling for one.”

The Ofcom investigation followed one by the BBC’s own executive complaints unit (ECU), which concluded both the online and TV story “did not meet the BBC’s standards of due accuracy”.

In the January following the coverage, the BBC issued an apology and confirmed it had amended the story on its website, also issuing a clarification of the TV report aired on the same day.

A Muslim convert has told how he was ordered by an Islamic State jihadi to launch a ram or bomb attack on Oxford Street to “make them pay in blood”.

Lewis Ludlow, 27, from Rochester in Kent, researched and scouted for targets around London and wrote down plans before his arrest last April.

The defendant, who called himself the Ghost and Eagle, also recorded a pledge of allegiance to IS, saying he had nothing but “animosity and hatred”.

He plotted the attack after being stopped from travelling to the Philippines, the Old Bailey heard.

The former Royal Mail worker has pleaded guilty to preparing acts of terrorism in the UK and funding terrorism abroad.

Giving evidence, he told how he had rejected an MI5 advance in March 2017 but agreed to engage with the Prevent programme.

Ludlow said he wanted to travel to the Philippines in February last year to find a wife and start a “new life” but kept his plans a secret from his Prevent mentor.

When he was stopped at the airport, he felt “bitter” and “heartbroken”, he said, adding: “I felt that I was trapped like an animal unable to escape its cage.”

On learning he would not be travelling, his IS-supporting friend in the Philippines Abu Yaqeen first asked him to send money to help pay for bullets and medical supplies, Ludlow said.

The defendant, who has autism, went on to describe how Yaqeen gradually talked him into plotting an attack in Britain.

He claimed he went to London to print off a picture of the black IS flag and research “busy shopping centre” on the orders of Yaqeen.

“On this plot, it was a bit like wheeling in very slowly. I thought to myself, I don’t think he will try to make me do something stupid like try to harm someone,” Ludlow said.

Later, Yaqeen told him he had to “kill” people during a chat on an encrypted app, he said.

Ludlow said: “He said to me, ‘The reason I asked you to research busy shopping centres is because you need to do something against these kuffar in the land of the crusader’.

“I said, ‘What do you mean’. He said, ‘You have to kill them’ and then he tried to encourage me to prepare to get involved in an act.

“I said no at first, I did not want to because I felt this was a bit scary and then he said, ‘You have to do it. You have to kill them, make them pay in blood, you must get revenge. They are not innocent. They deserve to die’.

“He said the best way to do so was using a ram attack. He said in order to achieve such a spectacular attack we should use a truck bomb attack to achieve the necessary effect.

“He said to me, ‘Don’t you want to die a martyr? They deserve it’.”

Ludlow said Yaqeen mentioned targets including Oxford Street, St Paul’s Cathedral and Shia temples.

The defendant said he was told to go to London to “scout”, take pictures, make notes and prepare an oath.

He told the court he photographed various potential targets including Madame Tussauds and around Oxford Street.

Ludlow said he wrote notes about killing up to 100 people in a ram attack or using an improvised explosive device to “maximise” casualties.

Asked if he had anywhere in mind, Ludlow said: “He just said Oxford Street. There was no particular building mentioned.”

Rebecca Trowler QC, defending, asked: “Do you accept at that time you intended that the kind of attack described in these notes would at some point in the future be carried out?”

Ludlow said: “At that particular time yes but there was no date set.”

He claimed Yaqeen was persistent and put pressure on him, so he “went along with it and followed his instructions”.

In the end, Ludlow said he decided to stop and ripped up his notes because he felt “guilty at what I had done”.

The defendant told the court he suffered from anxiety attacks like “whispers from the devil”.

Judge Nicholas Hilliard QC will conclude the sentencing at a later date.