The BBC committed a "serious breach" of broadcasting rules by omitting to mention that the presenter of a programme about the Gaza conflict was the child of a Hamas administrator, as determined by regulatory body Ofcom.
An probe by the broadcasting watchdog into the programme Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has concluded that the documentary was "significantly deceptive".
The chief executive of the broadcaster had earlier expressed regret, stating there had been "a significant failing in relation to truthfulness".
Ofcom has directed the BBC to broadcast a peak-time statement about its findings.
"Since this amounts to a major infringement of our code, we are instructing the broadcaster to air a statement of our conclusions against it on the BBC's second channel at nine o'clock in the evening, with a date to be determined," the statement read.
'Possibility to Undermine Confidence'
The watchdog's announcement declared: "Our probe concluded that the film's lack of disclosure that the voice's male guardian held a post in the Hamas-administered government was significantly deceptive.
"Consequently that the public did not have critical information which may have been very significant to their judgment of the voice and the details he presented.
"Confidence is at the core of the bond between a media organization and its public, notably for a public service broadcaster such as the public broadcaster.
"This oversight had the risk to damage the very considerable amounts of trust that the public would have put in a factual film from the broadcaster about the Gaza conflict."
The programme was pulled from iPlayer in February after the presenter's personal associations came to light, and in this past July an corporation's own inquiry found it infringed the organization's editorial guidelines on accuracy.
A BBC spokesperson said: "The Ofcom ruling is in accordance with the conclusions of the corporation's inquiry, that there was a serious error in the programme in relation to the BBC's Editorial Guidelines on factual correctness, which corresponds to Rule 2.2 of Ofcom's Broadcasting Code.
"We issued an apology for this and we agree with the regulator's ruling in its entirety. We will comply with the penalty as soon as the timing and wording are finalised."
