The BBC committed a "serious breach" of broadcasting rules by omitting to mention that the narrator of a programme about the Gaza situation was the son of a Hamas representative, according to British broadcasting authority Ofcom.
An inquiry by Ofcom into the programme Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has concluded that the film was "substantially inaccurate".
The BBC's director general had already issued an apology, noting there had been "a serious error in relation to factual correctness".
The regulator has ordered the corporation to transmit a peak-time announcement about its findings.
"Since this amounts to a major infringement of our code, we are ordering the corporation to air a announcement of our conclusions against it on the BBC's second channel at 9pm, with a date to be finalised," the regulator stated.
'Possibility to Erode Confidence'
The regulator's announcement declared: "Our probe concluded that the documentary's omission to reveal that the narrator's parent occupied a role in the Hamas-administered administration was substantially inaccurate.
"Consequently that the public did not have critical information which may have been extremely pertinent to their judgment of the presenter and the content he provided.
"Trust is at the heart of the connection between a broadcaster and its public, especially for a national broadcasting corporation such as the BBC.
"This error had the potential to damage the significantly high levels of confidence that viewers would have placed in a BBC factual programme about the Israel-Gaza war."
The programme was removed from the BBC's streaming service in last February after the boy's personal associations came to light, and in July an corporation's own inquiry concluded it infringed the corporation's editorial guidelines on truthfulness.
A corporation official commented: "The regulator's decision is in agreement with the results of Peter Johnston's review, that there was a major oversight in the programme in relation to the broadcaster's journalistic policies on accuracy, which reflects regulation 2.2 of the regulator's media standards.
"We expressed regret for this and we comply with the regulator's ruling in full. We will adhere to the directive as soon as the timing and wording are confirmed."
