The BBC engaged in a "serious breach" of broadcasting rules by failing to disclose that the narrator of a documentary about the Gaza conflict was the son of a Hamas official, as determined by regulatory body Ofcom.
An investigation by the broadcasting watchdog into the documentary titled Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has found that the documentary was "materially misleading".
The chief executive of the broadcaster had earlier expressed regret, stating there had been "a major oversight in relation to factual correctness".
Ofcom has directed the BBC to air a peak-time statement about its conclusions.
"Given this constitutes a significant violation of our regulations, we are ordering the BBC to air a announcement of our determinations against it on BBC Two at 9pm, with a date to be finalised," the statement read.
'Potential to Undermine Credibility'
The watchdog's statement declared: "The inquiry we conducted determined that the film's omission to reveal that the voice's male guardian served in a role in the Hamas-run government was materially misleading.
"It meant that the audience did not have vital facts which may have been very significant to their judgment of the voice and the information he provided.
"Trust is at the core of the connection between a broadcaster and its public, particularly for a national broadcasting corporation such as the public broadcaster.
"This oversight had the potential to erode the significantly high amounts of confidence that the public would have invested in a BBC factual programme about the Israel-Gaza war."
The documentary was withdrawn from iPlayer in February after the narrator's familial connections came to light, and in the month of July an broadcaster's internal assessment concluded it infringed the organization's editorial guidelines on accuracy.
A corporation official stated: "The regulator's decision is in agreement with the results of the corporation's inquiry, that there was a serious error in the film in relation to the broadcaster's journalistic policies on accuracy, which aligns with regulation 2.2 of Ofcom's Broadcasting Code.
"We issued an apology for this and we comply with the regulator's ruling in its entirety. We will comply with the penalty as soon as the schedule and wording are confirmed."
