The BBC was found to have committed a "major breach" of industry standards by omitting to mention that the narrator of a film about the Gaza conflict was the offspring of a Hamas representative, according to British broadcasting authority Ofcom.
An inquiry by Ofcom into the documentary titled Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has concluded that the documentary was "significantly deceptive".
The BBC's director general had already issued an apology, stating there had been "a major oversight in relation to truthfulness".
Ofcom has directed the broadcaster to transmit a prime-time declaration about its findings.
"Given this constitutes a significant violation of our regulations, we are directing the corporation to broadcast a statement of our determinations against it on BBC Two at 21:00, with a schedule to be confirmed," the statement read.
'Possibility to Erode Trust'
The regulator's announcement stated: "Our investigation determined that the programme's failure to disclose that the presenter's parent served in a role in the Hamas-controlled administration was substantially inaccurate.
"Consequently that the audience did not have vital facts which may have been very significant to their assessment of the narrator and the details he presented.
"Credibility is at the heart of the connection between a media organization and its viewers, particularly for a public service broadcaster such as the British Broadcasting Corporation.
"This error had the risk to erode the significantly high amounts of confidence that the public would have placed in a documentary produced by the BBC about the Israel-Gaza war."
The film was removed from the BBC's streaming service in February after the presenter's family links were revealed, and in July an corporation's own inquiry concluded it infringed the organization's editorial guidelines on truthfulness.
A BBC spokesperson stated: "The regulator's decision is in agreement with the results of the internal assessment, that there was a serious error in the documentary in relation to the corporation's content standards on accuracy, which aligns with regulation 2.2 of the authority's broadcasting regulations.
"We issued an apology for this and we agree with Ofcom's decision in its entirety. We will adhere to the directive as soon as the date and language are determined."
