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The British broadcaster committed a "serious breach" of broadcasting rules by omitting to mention that the voice of a documentary about the Gaza situation was the child of a Hamas administrator, according to British broadcasting authority Ofcom.

An probe by Ofcom into the documentary titled Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has concluded that the film was "significantly deceptive".

The chief executive of the broadcaster had previously apologised, noting there had been "a significant failing in relation to factual correctness".

Ofcom has directed the corporation to air a prime-time statement about its decisions.

"Since this amounts to a serious breach of our code, we are directing the corporation to broadcast a statement of our findings against it on BBC Two at 21:00, with a date to be finalised," the regulator stated.

'Risk to Undermine Trust'

The watchdog's report said: "Our investigation determined that the programme's failure to disclose that the presenter's parent occupied a post in the Hamas-run government was materially misleading.

"This implied that the audience did not have vital facts which may have been extremely pertinent to their judgment of the narrator and the details he presented.

"Confidence is at the core of the connection between a television network and its public, especially for a national broadcasting corporation such as the BBC.

"This oversight had the possibility to erode the very considerable amounts of trust that the public would have invested in a BBC factual programme about the conflict in Gaza."

The documentary was pulled from iPlayer in the month of February after the narrator's familial connections came to light, and in the month of July an corporation's own inquiry concluded it violated the organization's content policies on accuracy.

A representative for the broadcaster said: "The regulator's decision is in accordance with the findings of the internal assessment, that there was a significant failing in the documentary in relation to the BBC's Editorial Guidelines on accuracy, which reflects clause 2.2 of the authority's broadcasting regulations.

"We expressed regret for this and we accept the authority's determination in complete. We will comply with the penalty as soon as the schedule and wording are confirmed."