The BBC committed a "major breach" of broadcasting rules by failing to disclose that the narrator of a film about the Gaza conflict was the son of a Hamas official, as determined by British broadcasting authority Ofcom.
An probe by Ofcom into Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has determined that the film was "substantially inaccurate".
The chief executive of the broadcaster had already issued an apology, stating there had been "a serious error in relation to accuracy".
The regulator has ordered the broadcaster to broadcast a peak-time declaration about its conclusions.
"Since this amounts to a major infringement of our code, we are directing the BBC to transmit a message of our determinations against it on BBC Two at 9pm, with a schedule to be determined," the statement read.
'Possibility to Undermine Confidence'
The authority's statement declared: "Our investigation determined that the film's lack of disclosure that the narrator's male guardian occupied a role in the Hamas-run administration was materially misleading.
"It meant that the audience did not have critical information which may have been extremely pertinent to their judgment of the narrator and the details he shared.
"Trust is at the center of the bond between a broadcaster and its public, especially for a state-funded media outlet such as the British Broadcasting Corporation.
"This failing had the possibility to damage the exceptionally strong levels of confidence that audiences would have placed in a factual film from the broadcaster about the conflict in Gaza."
The documentary was removed from the online platform in February after the boy's familial connections came to light, and in July an corporation's own inquiry found it infringed the corporation's content policies on accuracy.
A representative for the broadcaster commented: "The authority's determination is in accordance with the conclusions of the internal assessment, that there was a serious error in the documentary in relation to the broadcaster's journalistic policies on truthfulness, which corresponds to regulation 2.2 of the authority's broadcasting regulations.
"We issued an apology for this and we accept the regulator's ruling in its entirety. We will follow the directive as soon as the date and wording are confirmed."
