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The public service broadcaster was found to have committed a "significant breach" of broadcasting rules by omitting to mention that the presenter of a programme about the Gaza situation was the child of a Hamas representative, as ruled by UK media regulator Ofcom.

An probe by the media regulator into Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has concluded that the documentary was "materially misleading".

The BBC's director general had already issued an apology, saying there had been "a significant failing in relation to factual correctness".

The regulator has ordered the BBC to transmit a peak-time statement about its findings.

"Given this constitutes a major infringement of our regulations, we are directing the corporation to broadcast a statement of our findings against it on BBC Two at 9pm, with a timing to be confirmed," the statement read.

'Risk to Erode Confidence'

The regulator's report stated: "The inquiry we conducted determined that the film's lack of disclosure that the narrator's father occupied a post in the Hamas-run government was materially misleading.

"This implied that the viewers did not have critical information which may have been highly relevant to their evaluation of the presenter and the details he shared.

"Trust is at the core of the bond between a media organization and its viewers, especially for a state-funded media outlet such as the public broadcaster.

"This error had the possibility to damage the significantly high degrees of trust that viewers would have invested in a factual film from the broadcaster about the Israel-Gaza war."

The film was pulled from the online platform in last February after the boy's family links came to light, and in this past July an internal BBC review concluded it breached the organization's content policies on truthfulness.

A corporation official commented: "The Ofcom ruling is in agreement with the results of the internal assessment, that there was a significant failing in the programme in relation to the corporation's content standards on truthfulness, which corresponds to Rule 2.2 of Ofcom's Broadcasting Code.

"We expressed regret for this and we accept Ofcom's decision in its entirety. We will comply with the sanction as soon as the schedule and wording are determined."