The British broadcaster engaged in a "major breach" of broadcasting rules by not revealing that the narrator of a documentary about Gaza was the offspring of a Hamas official, as determined by UK media regulator Ofcom.
An inquiry by the broadcasting watchdog into the documentary titled Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has determined that the documentary was "substantially inaccurate".
The chief executive of the broadcaster had previously apologised, noting there had been "a significant failing in relation to truthfulness".
The regulator has ordered the broadcaster to transmit a peak-time declaration about its findings.
"Since this amounts to a significant violation of our code, we are directing the broadcaster to broadcast a statement of our findings against it on the BBC's second channel at 9pm, with a timing to be finalised," the statement read.
'Risk to Damage Confidence'
The watchdog's statement declared: "Our investigation determined that the programme's failure to disclose that the narrator's father occupied a position in the Hamas-administered administration was significantly deceptive.
"This implied that the audience did not have vital facts which may have been extremely pertinent to their assessment of the presenter and the content he presented.
"Trust is at the core of the connection between a television network and its viewers, particularly for a national broadcasting corporation such as the BBC.
"This error had the risk to undermine the exceptionally strong levels of confidence that the public would have put in a factual film from the broadcaster about the Gaza conflict."
The programme was pulled from iPlayer in the month of February after the boy's familial connections emerged, and in this past July an broadcaster's internal assessment found it infringed the broadcaster's editorial guidelines on truthfulness.
A corporation official commented: "The Ofcom ruling is in line with the conclusions of the corporation's inquiry, that there was a significant failing in the documentary in relation to the corporation's content standards on accuracy, which aligns with Rule 2.2 of the regulator's media standards.
"We have apologised for this and we accept Ofcom's decision in full. We will comply with the sanction as soon as the schedule and wording are finalised."
