The public service broadcaster committed a "significant breach" of broadcasting rules by failing to disclose that the narrator of a programme about the Gaza conflict was the child of a Hamas administrator, as ruled by British broadcasting authority Ofcom.
An probe by the broadcasting watchdog into the programme Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has found that the documentary 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".
The authority has directed the BBC to transmit a evening announcement about its decisions.
"As this represents a significant violation of our regulations, we are ordering the corporation to air a statement of our conclusions against it on the BBC's second channel at 21:00, with a schedule to be confirmed," the statement read.
'Possibility to Undermine Trust'
The watchdog's report declared: "Our probe concluded that the film's failure to disclose that the voice's father served in a role in the Hamas-run government was materially misleading.
"This implied that the viewers did not have vital facts which may have been highly relevant to their evaluation of the presenter and the information he presented.
"Credibility is at the core of the relationship between a broadcaster and its viewers, notably for a public service broadcaster such as the public broadcaster.
"This error had the potential to damage the significantly high degrees of confidence that viewers would have invested in a factual film from the broadcaster about the Gaza conflict."
The film was removed from the online platform in February after the boy's familial connections came to light, and in this past July an broadcaster's internal assessment determined it violated the broadcaster's editorial guidelines on factual correctness.
A BBC spokesperson commented: "The authority's determination is in line with the results of the corporation's inquiry, that there was a significant failing in the documentary in relation to the broadcaster's journalistic policies on accuracy, which corresponds to regulation 2.2 of the regulator's media standards.
"We have apologised for this and we comply with Ofcom's decision in complete. We will comply with the directive as soon as the schedule and wording are determined."
