The public service broadcaster engaged in a "serious breach" of media regulations by not revealing that the voice of a programme about the Gaza conflict was the child of a Hamas official, according to British broadcasting authority Ofcom.
An probe by the broadcasting watchdog into the documentary titled Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has determined that the film was "substantially inaccurate".
The BBC's director general had earlier expressed regret, noting there had been "a major oversight in relation to truthfulness".
The regulator has ordered the corporation to air a prime-time announcement about its conclusions.
"Given this constitutes a major infringement of our rules, we are ordering the corporation to broadcast a message of our conclusions against it on BBC Two at 9pm, with a date to be finalised," the regulator stated.
'Possibility to Damage Trust'
The authority's report stated: "The inquiry we conducted determined that the film's omission to reveal that the voice's father served in a position in the Hamas-administered authority was significantly deceptive.
"Consequently that the audience did not have vital facts which may have been very significant to their evaluation of the narrator and the information he provided.
"Confidence is at the center of the relationship between a broadcaster and its viewers, especially for a state-funded media outlet such as the BBC.
"This oversight had the potential to undermine the exceptionally strong degrees of confidence that audiences would have placed in a documentary produced by the BBC about the Gaza conflict."
The film was withdrawn from the BBC's streaming service in last February after the boy's family links were revealed, and in the month of July an broadcaster's internal assessment determined it infringed the broadcaster's editorial guidelines on accuracy.
A representative for the broadcaster commented: "The regulator's decision is in line with the conclusions of Peter Johnston's review, that there was a significant failing in the documentary in relation to the BBC's Editorial Guidelines on truthfulness, which corresponds to regulation 2.2 of the authority's broadcasting regulations.
"We issued an apology for this and we agree with the authority's determination in its entirety. We will adhere to the directive as soon as the date and wording are confirmed."
