The British broadcaster committed a "major breach" of media regulations by omitting to mention that the narrator of a documentary about Gaza was the child of a Hamas official, as ruled by UK media regulator Ofcom.
An inquiry by Ofcom into the documentary titled Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has concluded that the programme was "materially misleading".
The chief executive of the broadcaster had already issued an apology, noting there had been "a significant failing in relation to truthfulness".
Ofcom has ordered the BBC to broadcast a prime-time declaration about its findings.
"Given this constitutes a major infringement of our regulations, we are ordering the BBC to transmit a message of our findings against it on the BBC's second channel at 9pm, with a date to be confirmed," the regulator stated.
'Risk to Erode Confidence'
The authority's report declared: "Our investigation found that the documentary's lack of disclosure that the presenter's male guardian occupied a role in the Hamas-run administration was significantly deceptive.
"It meant that the viewers did not have critical information which may have been highly relevant to their assessment of the presenter and the details he shared.
"Trust is at the heart of the connection between a television network and its viewers, notably for a national broadcasting corporation such as the BBC.
"This error had the risk to undermine the exceptionally strong amounts of trust that audiences would have put in a factual film from the broadcaster about the Gaza conflict."
The programme was removed from the online platform in last February after the narrator's familial connections emerged, and in this past July an broadcaster's internal assessment determined it breached the organization's journalistic standards on accuracy.
A corporation official said: "The regulator's decision is in line with the conclusions of Peter Johnston's review, that there was a major oversight in the programme in relation to the BBC's Editorial Guidelines on truthfulness, which corresponds to clause 2.2 of Ofcom's Broadcasting Code.
"We have apologised for this and we comply with Ofcom's decision in full. We will follow the directive as soon as the date and wording are determined."
