The British broadcaster committed a "major breach" of broadcasting rules by omitting to mention that the presenter of a film about Gaza was the offspring of a Hamas administrator, according to UK media regulator Ofcom.
An probe by the media regulator into the documentary titled Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has determined that the programme was "materially misleading".
The chief executive of the broadcaster had already issued an apology, saying there had been "a significant failing in relation to accuracy".
The authority has directed the broadcaster to transmit a prime-time statement about its conclusions.
"As this represents a major infringement of our regulations, we are ordering the broadcaster to air a announcement of our findings against it on BBC Two at 21:00, with a date to be determined," the statement read.
'Potential to Damage Confidence'
The watchdog's statement said: "Our probe found that the programme's failure to disclose that the narrator's male guardian held a post in the Hamas-controlled authority was significantly deceptive.
"Consequently that the public did not have essential details which may have been highly relevant to their judgment of the presenter and the content he provided.
"Trust is at the center of the bond between a media organization and its audience, particularly for a national broadcasting corporation such as the British Broadcasting Corporation.
"This failing had the risk to erode the very considerable amounts of confidence that the public would have placed in a factual film from the broadcaster about the conflict in Gaza."
The documentary was pulled from iPlayer in last February after the boy's family links emerged, and in the month of July an internal BBC review found it breached the corporation's editorial guidelines on truthfulness.
A corporation official stated: "The regulator's decision is in line with the findings of the internal assessment, that there was a significant failing in the film in relation to the corporation's content standards on accuracy, which aligns with regulation 2.2 of the authority's broadcasting regulations.
"We issued an apology for this and we comply with the authority's determination in full. We will follow the penalty as soon as the date and language are finalised."
