The British broadcaster engaged in a "significant breach" of media regulations by omitting to mention that the narrator of a documentary about the Gaza conflict was the offspring of a Hamas representative, according to UK media regulator Ofcom.
An investigation by the broadcasting watchdog into Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has found that the programme was "materially misleading".
The chief executive of the broadcaster had already issued an apology, noting there had been "a major oversight in relation to factual correctness".
The regulator has instructed the broadcaster to air a prime-time statement about its conclusions.
"Given this constitutes a major infringement of our regulations, we are instructing the broadcaster to transmit a announcement of our findings against it on BBC2 at nine o'clock in the evening, with a schedule to be finalised," the regulator stated.
'Possibility to Erode Trust'
The regulator's report said: "The inquiry we conducted found that the programme's lack of disclosure that the voice's father held a position in the Hamas-run authority was materially misleading.
"This implied that the audience did not have essential details which may have been highly relevant to their judgment of the voice and the content he provided.
"Credibility is at the heart of the bond between a television network and its audience, notably for a state-funded media outlet such as the public broadcaster.
"This error had the possibility to undermine the exceptionally strong amounts of confidence that viewers would have put in a BBC factual programme about the conflict in Gaza."
The documentary was withdrawn from the online platform in the month of February after the narrator's familial connections emerged, and in July an internal BBC review found it infringed the organization's journalistic standards on truthfulness.
A corporation official stated: "The authority's determination is in line with the conclusions of the corporation's inquiry, that there was a major oversight in the programme in relation to the BBC's Editorial Guidelines on truthfulness, which corresponds to regulation 2.2 of the regulator's media standards.
"We have apologised for this and we comply with the authority's determination in its entirety. We will follow the directive as soon as the timing and wording are determined."
