The BBC committed a "serious breach" of broadcasting rules by failing to disclose that the presenter of a documentary about the Gaza conflict was the son of a Hamas representative, as determined by UK media regulator Ofcom.
An inquiry by the broadcasting watchdog into the programme Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has determined that the documentary was "substantially inaccurate".
The BBC's director general had earlier expressed regret, stating there had been "a major oversight in relation to factual correctness".
The authority has ordered the corporation to broadcast a prime-time statement about its conclusions.
"Given this constitutes a significant violation of our rules, we are instructing the corporation to transmit a announcement of our findings against it on BBC Two at nine o'clock in the evening, with a schedule to be determined," it said.
'Possibility to Damage Credibility'
The authority's statement declared: "The inquiry we conducted concluded that the film's failure to disclose that the narrator's male guardian served in a post in the Hamas-controlled government was materially misleading.
"Consequently that the public did not have essential details which may have been highly relevant to their assessment of the presenter and the information he presented.
"Confidence is at the heart of the relationship between a broadcaster and its public, especially for a public service broadcaster such as the public broadcaster.
"This error had the possibility to erode the exceptionally strong amounts of credibility that viewers would have placed in a factual film from the broadcaster about the Gaza conflict."
The film was withdrawn from iPlayer in the month of February after the boy's family links came to light, and in this past July an corporation's own inquiry found it breached the broadcaster's journalistic standards on accuracy.
A representative for the broadcaster commented: "The regulator's decision is in agreement with the results of the corporation's inquiry, that there was a significant failing in the film in relation to the corporation's content standards on factual correctness, which reflects clause 2.2 of Ofcom's Broadcasting Code.
"We have apologised for this and we comply with the authority's determination in its entirety. We will adhere to the sanction as soon as the schedule and language are confirmed."
