The British broadcaster committed a "major breach" of industry standards by failing to disclose that the presenter of a programme about the Gaza conflict was the offspring of a Hamas administrator, according to UK media regulator Ofcom.
An inquiry by the media regulator into the programme Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has determined that the film was "substantially inaccurate".
The chief executive of the broadcaster had already issued an apology, saying there had been "a serious error in relation to accuracy".
The authority has ordered the corporation to air a prime-time declaration about its conclusions.
"As this represents a major infringement of our rules, we are ordering the BBC to broadcast a statement of our findings against it on BBC2 at nine o'clock in the evening, with a timing to be finalised," the statement read.
'Potential to Erode Credibility'
The watchdog's report stated: "Our investigation found that the programme's lack of disclosure that the voice's male guardian served in a position in the Hamas-controlled authority was materially misleading.
"It meant that the public did not have essential details which may have been extremely pertinent to their evaluation of the narrator and the content he presented.
"Credibility is at the heart of the connection between a broadcaster and its public, particularly for a public service broadcaster such as the public broadcaster.
"This failing had the potential to undermine the very considerable amounts of trust that viewers would have placed in a BBC factual programme about the Israel-Gaza war."
The programme was removed from the online platform in last February after the presenter's family links came to light, and in July an broadcaster's internal assessment found it violated the organization's content policies on accuracy.
A BBC spokesperson said: "The regulator's decision is in line with the conclusions of Peter Johnston's review, that there was a major oversight in the programme in relation to the broadcaster's journalistic policies on accuracy, which corresponds to clause 2.2 of Ofcom's Broadcasting Code.
"We expressed regret for this and we agree with the authority's determination in complete. We will comply with the sanction as soon as the date and language are confirmed."
