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The BBC committed a "major breach" of media regulations by not revealing that the narrator of a documentary about the Gaza situation was the son of a Hamas administrator, as ruled by UK media regulator Ofcom.

An investigation by the broadcasting watchdog into the programme Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has concluded that the documentary was "materially misleading".

The chief executive of the broadcaster had already issued an apology, stating there had been "a major oversight in relation to accuracy".

Ofcom has directed the corporation to broadcast a peak-time announcement about its conclusions.

"As this represents a serious breach of our regulations, we are instructing the broadcaster to air a message of our determinations against it on BBC Two at 21:00, with a schedule to be determined," the regulator stated.

'Potential to Damage Confidence'

The authority's announcement declared: "The inquiry we conducted determined that the programme's failure to disclose that the voice's father held a position in the Hamas-controlled government was substantially inaccurate.

"It meant that the public did not have essential details which may have been extremely pertinent to their judgment of the presenter and the details he presented.

"Credibility is at the center of the connection between a media organization and its viewers, particularly for a national broadcasting corporation such as the British Broadcasting Corporation.

"This oversight had the potential to damage the very considerable levels of trust that viewers would have placed in a documentary produced by the BBC about the conflict in Gaza."

The film was pulled from the BBC's streaming service in the month of February after the narrator's family links were revealed, and in July an broadcaster's internal assessment concluded it violated the corporation's editorial guidelines on accuracy.

A BBC spokesperson said: "The regulator's decision is in line with the results of the internal assessment, that there was a significant failing in the film in relation to the BBC's Editorial Guidelines on factual correctness, which reflects Rule 2.2 of Ofcom's Broadcasting Code.

"We issued an apology for this and we accept the authority's determination in its entirety. We will comply with the penalty as soon as the schedule and wording are confirmed."